Sanctuary and Asylum 99
by Negative-Z
Summary: In the aftermath of torment our aliens find their foresight. By the gravity of freedom our friends search out their starlight.
1. Verse Eleven is Shadow

Sanctuary and Asylum -99-  
  
Forward-Forewarned:  
  
***  
  
In the aftermath of torment---our aliens find their foresight.  
  
By the gravity of freedom---our friends search out their starlight.  
  
***  
  
Regardless of the details that might deter new interests from bringing themselves up to this point, these are the final verses. Sanctuary and Asylum, begun at [.33] and continued through 66, will ^not^ be abandoned.  
  
Once again, to all those who have not yet read Sanctuary please do. I'm grateful for all consideration and recommend beginning from the beginning to anyone who wants to enjoy the story.  
  
---  
  
There are a number of whoever's gratitudes, compliments, and questions still to answer directly, and I plan to do so an Afterward-Aftermath. Till then, there are only a few things needed to properly welcome those invaluable individuals who've come this far for an ending.  
  
The last third will be finished in least time, and just as sections have been ever mired in over-ambition, so will they again be burdened with cliché. I am offering neither a warning nor a preemptive apology here; fanfiction, by its very nature, begs for wasted and regretted time. A metaphorical synopsis rhyme does little to sweeten the upturned palms, but like its predecessors, it is intended to encourage readers to touch their heads, and mouths, with new ideas, if second thoughts.  
  
However the characters may have exercised their insight up to this point, it is now easy to assume that the future of Tenchi and his family will rely on their 'foresight', on how they project themselves adjusting to an 'aftermath'. Seeking a guide, a consort, a 'starlight', is a common theme in almost every story, but with so much space and so much 'gravity' for the performers to consider it might be easiest to recycle, or sacrifice the carnival altogether. When the end comes, I hope to have brought them and their audience something more.  
  
***  
  
Standard Disclaimer:  
  
I thank all the owners of the Tenchi characters who have chosen not to sue me for suggesting some alternative uses for them.  
  
Standard Advertisement:  
  
I thank all the readers who have perused my other submissions and favorite authors.  
  
Standard Procedure:  
  
Isolate perpetually transient items from freshly sterilized areas.  
  
Tenchi Muyo: Sanctuary and Asylum  
  
-Verse Eleven is Shadow-  
  
***  
  
Her rain is like black rust. And melts down heavy on dreaming heads.  
  
It cuts through.  
  
She floods the haunting roads of the past. Like the dark night embraces a shadow.  
  
A fold in time brings her madness. Worn from an age of wars.  
  
A sovereign pain.  
  
A will tattered by a thousand storms. An explosion of memories echo in the skull.  
  
Faith in this.  
  
Will bring us all.  
  
To her.  
  
We will know.  
  
And feel  
  
All that is real.  
  
-Neurosis (Sovereign)  
  
***  
  
"Snow storms in Tokyo have-"  
  
Tenchi killed the well-dressed anchor with a button.  
  
"I'm home! Boy oh boy it's cold out there!" Nobuyuki slammed the front door and eagerly escaped his snow-caked jacket.  
  
"Welcome home dad," Tenchi offered some warmth as he tossed the TV remote to the other side of the couch, "we saved some dinner for you."  
  
"Thanks, I'm starving."  
  
Sasami stepped out of the kitchen with a dishtowel and freshly dried plate.  
  
"Welcome home Mr. Misaki, I already made you a plate, you shouldn't have to reheat it too long."  
  
"Let's hope not." Nobuyuki hurried into the kitchen and prepared the microwave. It took him a few tries to get a similar greeting to Mihoshi through the clatter of dishes.  
  
"It was really good." Tenchi added over his shoulder.  
  
"^Little Washu didn't seem to think so^." Sasami mumbled to herself as she weakly set the dish on the counter and herself on the couch, making a lap for a sluggish Ryo-ohki.  
  
Tenchi opened his mouth with a smile to make friendly, but the pleasantry-momentum had expired. He closed his eyes and sighed.  
  
"Come on Sasami, you know your food is the best. Washu's just--- wanting to spend more time with grandpa, that's all."  
  
"Yeeeah, I know." Sasami brushed away his reassurance rudely enough for an eye-role. Tenchi told himself that time and times were more than enough to excuse less than the usual sweet self, but he still had to swallow.  
  
Aeka entered the living room with a polite bow. Nobuyuki promptly raised his chopsticks above a stuffed smile. She was walking in Tenchi's direction when Ryoko phased in and sat down by his side.  
  
Cocooning herself in an afghan tightly enough to leave only the remote free, Ryoko flipped through the channels with surly disinterest. Tenchi's gulp and Aeka's glare were both lost in the rejuvenated babble. She barely breathed between odd shivers.  
  
The only thing on Tenchi's mind was an escape, preferably a tactful one. He'd been forming them every time he even smelled the space between the two girls. In a double-dare he looked away from the friend next to him to dare a glance at Aeka. She had already sat down next to her sister, petting Ryo-ohki and speaking hesitantly. The cabbit hardly seemed to notice.  
  
"Don't worry Sasami, she did take some with her."  
  
"Forget it." Sasami hung her head lower and let her hands rest along her legs.  
  
Aeka looked up and caught Tenchi watching them. He seemed to recognize her plea for assistance and forced himself not to look away. He couldn't speak of course, but at least he could smile. Instead of looking away before she smiled back, she missed his surprise as she instead passed over him to Ryoko.  
  
"Ryoko, isn't dinner always delicious?" The diplomatic tenderness was obviously more for the sake of Sasami's doubt than her rival's isolation.  
  
Ryoko changed the channel again without an answer.  
  
"Ryoko, I asked you a question." Agitation trembled in Aeka's voice.  
  
The pattern had continued steadily since their forcefully indirect reactions to Washu's good news, one tightening and sharpening their manners while the other let them rust.  
  
"Ryoko?!"  
  
Sasami picked up Ryo-ohki and gently set her down on the cushion next to her. She began standing slowly, clenched fists, and closed eyes. Only Ryoko was able to ignore the obviously imminent announcement. The formality of her movements snapped as she flung her teary eyes open and tried to shout in both directions at once.  
  
"Am I the only one around here who has to be happy all the time?! Can't I just be grumpy once in a while, ^huh^?!" She pulled in a harsh breath through her nose, igniting a fierce tremble in her fists.  
  
"Sasami!" Even Aeka's gasp was held in close.  
  
"I've---I've got just as much right to still be upset as anyone!" The tears broke through her tight eyes.  
  
Without a forethought, Tenchi looked over at Ryoko. He only saw the side of her face, still lost in a dull TV glaze. By the lack and distribution of color it was hard to tell if she was drunk again before Sasami recalled their attention with an even louder outburst.  
  
"You all go on about how we need to remember that he's dead, that we can all go back to normal, well he's never ^really^ gonna be dead and nothing's ever ^really^ gonna go back to normal!" She began to sob again, and managed one last pitiful cry before rushing off.  
  
"I just want us to all have dinner together!"  
  
The door slammed down the hall and silenced each movement in the house. Everyone remained mute till moments later Ryoko rose, letting the thick afghan fall absently around her feet. She held her arms solemnly and hung her head, but didn't shiver.  
  
"I'm going to bed."  
  
She closed the study door softly. Nobuyuki had cleared away a good deal of papers to set up a cot and space heater for her, and had received similarly lively thanks. Tenchi suspected that she would have exited this way regardless of the content or mood of the room.  
  
---  
  
After finishing his dinner, Nobuyuki helped Mihoshi finish the kitchen in silence, leaving them with a forcibly more cheerful 'goodnight'. Tenchi bent and began refolding the afghan.  
  
"Thanks, Tenchi." Mihoshi murmured as she prepared her space on the couch behind him.  
  
"No problem, Mihoshi." He answered kindly without turning and put the folded comforter on the couch where it could be properly unfolded again. Aeka offered her own soft voice as he walked past.  
  
"Sleep well, Lord Tenchi."  
  
"You too, Aeka."  
  
There were times when Tenchi wished the stairs wouldn't creak so much, and times when he wished Aeka hadn't picked up Ryoko's talent for sneaking up on him.  
  
"Lord Tenchi."  
  
He looked to his side with a start and almost tripped on a step. She matched his pace without ever looking over at him.  
  
"I want to apologize for Sasami's behavior, she is at a time---when it's hard for-"  
  
"It's okay, Aeka." Tenchi tried to sound like he knew some things about enduring and explaining.  
  
They walked down the hall towards his room with a few silent steps before Aeka continued with a harsher note of difficulty.  
  
"I would also like to apologize for miss Ryoko."  
  
"Huh?" Tenchi glanced over in disbelief.  
  
"I have been trying to set an example, to get her to stop ^sulking^ all the time." Aeka sighed. "But it seems I am only making things worse."  
  
Tenchi looked away, blinking slow towards his room.  
  
"She's right you know."  
  
"What? Who is?"  
  
"Sasami."  
  
"H-How do you mean?"  
  
"It is probably stupid to think we can all just---go back to normal. Even if we'd seen him die ourselves, we'd still be-" Tenchi stopped and looked back down at Aeka. Her eyes were hidden under the rim of her hair.  
  
"All I mean is that we're all trying to deal with this our own way. We all-" something clenched in Tenchi's throat, but he swallowed it quickly, "we know what each other went through. And we all tried to say our peace up at the shrine."  
  
Tenchi felt the memories vie for which wall to tie his innards to; his grandfather saying a prayer for an empty urn, Mihoshi crying and crying without making a sound, and he'd sworn Washu really had sent her mechanical double to do nothing. It had already occurred to him that his Grandfather had actually been the only one to speak at the ceremony.  
  
"Ryoko wasn't there." Aeka reminded him darkly.  
  
Hating to think of things like bad dreams ever more, Tenchi closed his eyes tightly to scrape for the next way to dilute the animosity lingering in her throat. He couldn't deny his own distress with Ryoko's behavior, but planned never to admit it, to root it in Aeka.  
  
"I think Ryoko still blames herself for what happened to Grandpa." Tenchi tried to speak calmly, then tried to remember without thinking about how much she didn't tell them of that last confrontation at the shrine.  
  
Success was mixed as his next words were unnervingly even, and delivered at the end of the walk to his door.  
  
"And I think Seita must have tried hardest to get her to---to-"  
  
"Join him," Aeka finished with even less sympathy. Tenchi opened his mouth, but knew it wouldn't work. He hoped Aeka could sense how much it pained him to hear her talk this way, but she merely continued in a coarse mumble.  
  
"^At least she only had herself to worry about^."  
  
"Aeka." He reflexively asked for civility, unsure of who he was defending.  
  
"I-I'm sorry, Lord Tenchi. Please forgive me I-" The sobs began to rise in her throat, and she placed a hand tightly over her eyes. Her head lowered and Tenchi thought he felt her hair press against him before she even moved.  
  
"It's okay." He could the feel the words vibrate in his throat as clearly as he could feel her hair smoothed beneath his hands, but wasn't sure if she could hear him.  
  
Aeka leaned against him so forcefully that he almost had to support himself against the door to his room. The tears soaked warmly through his shirt, begging him to remain strong and screaming at him to join. She chose for him, backing away and wiping her face with the sleeve of her kimono.  
  
"Thank you Tenchi, for everything," she began with a tiny sniffle, "I would not have been able to make it through this ordeal without you."  
  
Tenchi heard her leave the title out of his name, the affection in her tone almost soothed the lingering voice that accused him of full responsibility. He hung his head with a heavy exhale, hoping only to wish her goodnight without more credit or criticism in any direction. Hearing her take a step forward he began raising his head in time to have Aeka spread her hands over his shoulders and kiss him on the cheek so close to his lips that he inadvertently kissed her back.  
  
"Please sleep well." She whispered, stepping back and down the hall without another word or glance up from the floor in front of her.  
  
The silk was still melting his face to the floor when he stepped into his room. All the rest of him was running, pumping him across the world too fast for any reason.  
  
***  
  
Aeka passed by Nobuyuki's study and stopped after a few steps. She tilted her head to the side with a suspicious expression before walking on to her room with a scowl. For some reason she hadn't heard any snoring.  
  
***  
  
The railing creaked near the entrance to Yosho's office as Washu leaned, eyes closed to the sensation of icy winds rustling her hair. She thought back to her lab, waiting for her at the bottom of all those steps, with climate control and the images of countless different environments all at her command. It had taken far less time than she'd imagined getting almost everything back online again, even with her post-robotic commitment. Yet, as sterile-pleasing as this was, she knew it would be impossible to duplicate the exact feeling of tranquility she could have at the shrine. With all the snow she had expected it to be more dormant than peaceful, but was glad to be wrong.  
  
"These coats of yours are quite impressive." Katshuhito walked up behind her with two steaming mugs and a content smile.  
  
Washu pinched and massaged the corner of her wide collar, looking down at the change of color in the thick plush material. The old man stood next to her, working the handles into one hand and using the other to brush some snow off the railing to make a place for their drinks. The slushy swipe ended with a dull plop in the growing mass.  
  
"But we are still in the early stages of winter, we might not be able to stand out here like this much longer." He blew on his tea, looking down at her cup, then not quite so far down at her face. It was hard for him to tell what she was looking at.  
  
"So what do you think of my decision?" He tried again after a little serious throat clearing.  
  
"What decision?" She asked plainly, if genuinely ignorant.  
  
"My 'retirement'." He clarified himself as if the idea were still playful to him, and as if she'd only been passing by when he'd made the announcement months ago.  
  
Washu quirked her mouth to the side and picked up her tea. She closed her eyes and shook with an almost inaudible chuckle, mixing breath with tea steam.  
  
"I guess this place could use a little freshening up." Her tease came out like an unenthusiastic joke.  
  
"There is nothing wrong with Misaki Shrine," Katshuhito frowned seriously and took another sip, "it is merely a practical matter."  
  
"Oh?"  
  
"Yes, more of the older patrons have begun making comments on my longevity."  
  
"I see." Washu stepped back from the railing and looked down at her tea for enough time to prepare her next long drink...now she could give the tiny dregs at the bottom the same blank stare.  
  
"Are you sure you're not just trying to wash your hands of something." The personal question came out decidedly more genuine and less reserved. She moved her head very slowly towards him, catching his face in time to see him pocket his glasses and take a very deep breath. As far as she could tell he was restraining either the stress of indignation or indecision. Washu looked back out at the sleeping forest.  
  
"You never really told us what happened up here," the long-jaded trickster continued to prod him without regard for his difficulty or her own class, "or was that ceremony your way of closing the book on the whole thing."  
  
Katshuhito let out his breath almost forcefully, but took his tea with utmost patience.  
  
"As I recall, Miss Washu, you never really told us what happened 'down there'."  
  
Washu's face darkened. She quickly swallowed the last of her tea and set the mug down. She pursed her lips roughly rather than wipe them, looking deeper into the forest without any apparent intention of a reply. Not a branch moved for the wind, even as she brought more into her field of vision. And still more fell under her scrutiny; mechanically analyzing the spectrums of the two color extremes, extracting a pattern from the various heights of the trees and curves of the forest floor. It would translate to numeric code easily enough.  
  
No real point in being up here, then. She should be back in her lab. Now. What was she thinking, coming up here like this? He won't give any straight answers, and she can't. That feeling: eyes pressing together, jaw slouching, it means 'time to abort'.  
  
"I-"  
  
*No. Yosho, please don't. Neither of us is ready yet.  
  
Washu tried to close her eyes, but only dropped her head. Some of the larger roots were still visible, and she knew she could see the life flowing through them and knew it made her feel metallic, sterile-separated. Wanting Yosho to know her thoughts was new to her, and she hated futile stubbornness. If there was any chance of him turning back, he had to take it now.  
  
"I believe what happened, between Seita and myself, was as much between he and I," Yosho looked down at his tea, uncertain of how to be lost again, "as it was between us and ourselves."  
  
Impossible, but it was going to hurt even more in a second, when she ignored what it had taken for him to say this, and dismantled what it gave to her. She could estimate to the number how long she crushed and melted her expression at the far corner of the shrine, and count to the decimal till it was ready to even be dropped at his feet.  
  
"Though I'm not sure if that makes any sense."  
  
The sound of Yosho's uncertainty was the memory of his deterioration, but disagreeing with him before she knew why pushed out the other pains like a callous tyrant. After he drained his tea and set the mug on the railing next to its match her eyes managed to follow his hands up to his chest. Swallowing and speaking made her hurt like a little girl.  
  
"Actually, it does."  
  
Yosho turned toward her, hands in his pockets like a man rather than a priest, and she could feel him looking at her like a woman rather than a genius child. The jacket's pockets could connect, and she saw him twist something on his wrist.  
  
A few soft hums of energy set the tone for his voice. "Then, could you at least be yourself around me?"  
  
The vulnerability was too old, or naive to even border on flirtation, but Washu wanted to blush so badly. She pulled her coat closer against more breeze than was there, wishing he was in it.  
  
It was possible, truly, she could let him know everything, how weakened she felt, how all her experience was being surrounded by wounded animals, whimpering that she wasn't really a doctor anymore. This was the right and best thing to do, but she knew it was a huge wave headed to break a damn in the sky; justification wanted more answers, and wouldn't let its opportunity go.  
  
"Yosho, after all this, has your 'faith' in anything, has it changed?"  
  
Washu pulled her coat closer still, shivering now that she deserved to.  
  
"Yes." Yosho answered solemnly after another real breeze had fully come and gone.  
  
For all the strength it took to face him then, she was disheartened to see his eyes closed, then struck dumb to see them reflect her own forced reason.  
  
"I cannot uproot the seeds of doubt, each day will be a battle now simply to continue what I'd made second nature centuries ago. And whatever he did to me---I know I must have helped him."  
  
He swallowed almost invisibly.  
  
"So yes, my faith, my self, they will never be as strong again."  
  
Yosho closed his eyes. And at his sincere, hopeful smile Washu closed her own to feel his every breath.  
  
"But even though I am now less sure of things, I am also less afraid. It is my faith in all of you that has strengthened. Tenchi, Aeka, even yourself, you've all endured something that no shrine or dojo could have imagined preparing for. Now we have the even greater opportunity to survive it."  
  
He turned and opened his eyes to reach for the mugs, shaking the dregs out before turning.  
  
"I simply hope this new young man takes enough time to-" Yosho made a sound like a hiccup as he startled back a step and dropped the mugs, not bothering to watch as they shattered. He stared eye to eye and to the rest of Washu.  
  
She shifted her folded arms in the slightly more snug-fitting coat and looked down at the pile of shards between them. With eyes closed tentatively, she stepped forward with a crunch of ice and ceramic. Her voice was throaty and anxious.  
  
"I try not to depend on second chances."  
  
Washu held Yosho by the neck with both hands, making him tense for the surprising warmth. Slow melting movements closed his eyes and brought his hands up to the small of her back. She leaned and stretched, taunted and cursed back at reasons while they were momentarily taken off guard by so many ancient and fragile ideas.  
  
Their kiss deepened and traded angles before Washu finally pulled back, waiting for Yosho to open his eyes. It was strangely paralyzing to see someone look at her like a benevolent Goddess, yet the strange mixture of desire and fear did look handsome on him.  
  
His first steps inside her emerald pools quickly retreated as panic shimmered across them like a sudden memory.  
  
Washu removed her hands and stepped back, looking down and walking past him.  
  
"I'm sorry, I have to go." She muttered, summoning her laptop and typing at it as she quickly descended the stairs.  
  
Yosho extended a hand and an anxious expression shortly before she walked into a subspace shortcut. He turned back and looked at what remained of his favorite two mugs. As he bent to pick up some of the larger shards he stopped and moved his head toward the forest, sensing what might have been the death throws of a distant earthquake.  
  
***  
  
The air above the trees was nearly freezing. Ryoko, however, could fly thorough it fast enough to defiantly invert it into a burning pressure against her face. She'd already bit back at the numbness in her fingers by making them crush themselves. Another amusing thought combusted with the rest; she imagined her sweat pushing back into her hair and freezing it in an even more monstrous style.  
  
With a snarl blown out to a grotesque howl, the wind shouted back even louder. She flew closer to treetops and spread her eyes gleefully at the rage that brought the rough and moldy white sea even closer.  
  
And she wondered if she were going fast enough to set these Popsicle sticks on fire yet.  
  
Her teeth clenched tighter and her chest began to shake, reminding her of what it was like to laugh when there was absolutely nothing funny about a situation. Kagato had taught her how to do it.  
  
Thus she slowed, but not enough to make the laughing stop. Gloves full of angry swarms still shook her by the skull and tightened her smile. Finally stopped above a small clearing, she looked down to see her own ghostly reflection, a tiny glare of color on a frozen pond. She tried to push back the hands in her head with her own. Dry-ice feathers were soft for a moment.  
  
The laughter was still clearly audible, pecking out of her throat in a repetition so much like a little girl giggling and gasping back sobs.  
  
"Pop-si-cle sticks..." Her voice jumped out in a scrambled Morse code.  
  
"Trees. Trees. Treeeeeeeeeeeeeeees!"  
  
Ryoko grabbed two fistfuls of hair close to the root, now a deceptively strong and potentially razor-edged plastic. She fused her eyes shut, then flung them open as wide as possible. Her reflection on the ice below looked like a stain poorly scrubbed off a wall.  
  
Clenched hands slid out of her hair and clapped above her head, praise and pleas as every muscle in her body strangled itself. The energy rising between her hands was beginning to burn, ready to vaporize the rest of her if she didn't let it out.  
  
"STIIICKS!"  
  
The scream brought her hands down and aimed a blast directly at the bit of color on the pond. Dirty ice and smoke made it past her fangs during the moment of bliss when everything disappeared beneath her blinding wrath.  
  
Weak, she panted, almost too drained to stay afloat. Desperate breaths clenched her fists tight against her thighs and sank her toward the crater's edge. She blinked lifelessly, guessing it was probably a little smaller than the one left behind after her fight with Seita. If she didn't move her head she wouldn't have to see anything; smoke and black rocks instead of snow and trees. The laughing had stopped so she'd been right.  
  
After positioning herself on a cooler boulder she made two efforts to look up just so far. She was deep enough to only see the stars scattered around the rim of her hole.  
  
"You really should be more careful, you know. I don't exactly have power to spare for repairs like this." Washu tried to call it teasing.  
  
Ryoko whirled at the small excess of red hair making its careful way around the scorched stone. She almost instantly turned back and clenched her fists.  
  
"Then don't"  
  
Another hop and Washu stood next to her.  
  
"What's going on Ryoko? You've always had a temper, but releasing this much energy could do some serious damage to this planet, not to mention yourself."  
  
No response, then definitely no response.  
  
"I suppose I should be grateful that the other gems are still in the sword, I haven't seen you release this much power since-" Washu trailed off at the first gleam of pain in the only visible corner of Ryoko's eye. She cursed herself to have needed it.  
  
"Ryoko I-"  
  
"And it still wasn't enough." She reflected in a small, strained voice, easy for a genius to imitate.  
  
"What?"  
  
"I tried so hard, but I couldn't do a damn thing. I couldn't protect Tenchi. I couldn't even protect that silly old man." Overeager sobs shook her head in a choking motion. Clenching fists did little to steady it.  
  
Alongside her daughter, Washu looked helplessly into the crater for long moments, barely glancing to see if clogged flow had given in or retreated. Silence amid a freshly desolate setting began to wear thin. She tried to arrange the correct words, but the dead air itself began to frustrate her and she almost kicked a dirt clod down into the darkness simply to make a sound.  
  
Before the next chance for an idle distraction, Ryoko turned to level her eyes at Washu, then to curse her with them.  
  
"Why didn't you DO anything?!"  
  
Washu could only regard the mired tone with a stunned stare.  
  
"All that time...you knew what he was doing." Her voice hushed a little by the next futile choking back battle.  
  
"I did everything I-" Washu defended weakly after her own swallow.  
  
"The Hell you did!" Fresh tears pierced the moonlight as Ryoko jerked up and bore her fangs. "You ^knew^ what was happening, but you just hid in your little lab while he...while he-" her sobs came so forcefully this time that Ryoko had to cough, clutching her ribs. The black silence seemed ready to return for its next harvest.  
  
Washu was clenching her fists now as well, her newly healed fractures still hurt but all she could think of was violently embracing her daughter, begging forgiveness, trying to convince her that it was over.  
  
"It was---it was just like Kagato." The sobs were gone, replaced by a piercing mutter that vibrated out like last words.  
  
"Some bastard, playing with my mind, then threatening Tenchi---and I couldn't do anything." Ryoko sank onto the rocks, propping her elbows on her knees while her hands tried to breech the infection. "And you! And you just ^watched^!  
  
"Now wait just a damn minute," Washu shook, overwhelmed.  
  
"I did everything I could! Just because I couldn't get rid of him with a push of a button doesn't mean I just gave up." Fury had moved steadily forward, standing her over Ryoko to drip her own tears onto the quivering shock of hair.  
  
"I didn't stay in my lab because I was afraid; I needed him to be bored with me. I couldn't have him discovering the containment field."  
  
"It didn't work anyway!"  
  
Ryoko's voice echoed over the crater, the last vibration tearing Washu's best nerve into a furious calm.  
  
"It was all I could do."  
  
They stood fuming. Washu waited no longer than was absolutely necessary for Ryoko to speak, then frowned as harshly as she could.  
  
"Kagato is dead Ryoko, I removed the part of your physiology that allowed him to control you, and Seita," her teeth ground off to one side, "he's gone too. If we can't accept when scum like them are out of our lives, then there's no point in even fighting."  
  
Calming breaths conquered and subsided. Washu took Ryoko's next silence for understanding or exhaustion and tried to offer a hand up regardless.  
  
"Is Seita really dead?" Ryoko's voice rose like a vengeful corpse, her words digging rotted fingers into her mother's tendons.  
  
"W-What?" The genius child's little hand came trembling back to her mouth or throat.  
  
"Is he really gone, or do you still have him in a 'test tube' somewhere?" Ryoko raised her face but only to Washu's chest.  
  
"You can't be serious," Ryoko's previous dying voice was even easier to mirror this time.  
  
"Are you waiting to put him under a better microscope?" Ryoko continued, climbing to her feet and starring down into the fleshy part of scientist's heart. "Are you still tying to figure out how you can use his powers for you own-"  
  
Ryoko's feet worked automatically to keep the smack from knocking her over.  
  
"H-How ^dare you^! How can you even think that I would-" Washu stared back up with vicious denouncement.  
  
"Tell me, Washu." Still dead.  
  
"I just did!"  
  
"Tell me." Still dead and not convinced.  
  
"Ryoko, stop this." Weakened but still convincing.  
  
"Tell me."  
  
Washu folded her arms and calmed her eyes closed.  
  
"I don't have to be badgered here. I told you, 'he's gone'."  
  
For a fractioned moment Ryoko stood like a cemetery statue feigning remorse. Washu went pale as the stone cracked and flooded, eyelids forced down over golden fires, teeth clenched a breeze away from cracking.  
  
*Tell me.  
  
The shock of Ryoko's first forced communication made Washu clutch her skull in wonder. Her next breath was dense.  
  
*He's gone, I'm not lying to you.  
  
*Tell me.  
  
*This isn't going to help anything, you have to believe me!  
  
*TELL ME!  
  
Washu's stomach almost turned at the sudden terrifying awareness of another presence trying to force through the interlocked walls of her private mind. It was difficult to search through memories, even for her, and the agonized struggle on her daughter's face told well enough the inevitable outcome.  
  
This sudden fight to overcome her mistrust by making it obsolete drug back a distant memory of a child exploding into violence at their own parent for denying them some indulgence, kicking and screaming like a wild animal. Through the ordeal the mother could only stand fast, not fearing any physical harm, but agonizing through every tiny desperate blow.  
  
Washu waited with tortured patience till Ryoko collapsed to her knees, clutching her head in every place at once, sobbing again at full force. Washu bit tears out of her lip and bent once more to offer a hand.  
  
"Please Ryoko, please trust me."  
  
The short width of a deep chasm remained between them, Ryoko's teleportation echoing across it like a muffled tuning fork.  
  
***  
  
*Focus. Control. Action.  
  
*Focus. Control. Action.  
  
*Form. Form.  
  
*Focus. Control. Action.  
  
*Action. Action. Action!  
  
*Focus.  
  
*Control.  
  
*Action.  
  
*Focus. Control. Action.  
  
*...  
  
*Stupid! *^%$#$ing! Frozen! Firewood!  
  
Tenchi looked at the third-spilt log refreezing onto the axe. He flexed his hands and lifted Thor's Hammer just above his shoulders, bringing it down on the tree stump with a battle cry that was supposed to sound much mightier than it did. The hammer's head hit its target at a slight enough angle for the whole tool to tip and fall to the side.  
  
Some snow lodged in his gloves as he caught himself, but at least he kept his rear dry. Every grit of ice melted against his throbbing palms before he even stood up all the way. He almost expected them to start steaming.  
  
He looked at his progress, forgetting the prevailing quiet of the entire day and feeling every second of the two hours he'd spent to chop half a week's worth of firewood. The blisters were eager to rise through the gloves' padding, the sweat was running in happy rivers beneath his superbly insulated jacket, and his jaw still jumped with the recoil from each and every swing. Tenchi felt his temper beginning to waver and he held it back, not with any intent of keeping calm; he merely wanted to make the most of it.  
  
The tool stayed on the ground till his teeth were properly clenched, cursing incoherently as he thrust it forward at the stump to knock the log off. It finally dislodged when he stopped counting and rolled into the snow as he thrust the axe forward again like a ski poll to balance himself. His fists on the end of the handle dug into his belly so painfully that he flung the tool into the snow, hoping it would at least strike something wooden, not caring that it wouldn't make the late twilight any easier to see in.  
  
With a few stumbles and a series of raged breaths, he pulled off his jacket and yanked the sword from his belt. Jurai illuminated the snow like one big blue Christmas light.  
  
The small reserve stared back, daring him to step forward and make mulch instead of kindling. He stabilized the blade with his other hand and blew violent steam around it. A grin spread up one side of his face.  
  
"Now why didn't I think of this in the first place?" Tenchi asked himself deviously. It was easy to envision the blade flashing in the snow like a series of stylish photos, then he would stand back coolly as the wood lay unchanged for a moment before falling to pieces. But by the first step forward he was frozen. His grandfather's voice crept up his spine and down his hand, lowering the sword as a memory made its permanence known.  
  
Tenchi had been using the sword for just such a purpose in the autumn after Kagato's defeat. Katshuhito had snuck up on him and taken the sword so quickly that he'd almost swung his empty hand at the next log. After checking the ground, he swiftly turned around and saw his grandfather standing there, holding the deactivated hilt up like a stern endorsement.  
  
He'd know precisely what the problem was, but the foolish reflexes in his mouth hadn't.  
  
"Hey grandpa! What's the big idea?"  
  
His face had fallen into fear at the shadow spreading over him, and he'd felt it; and he'd hoped it would be enough to save him.  
  
"Tenchi, I've told you the history of this sword, haven't I?"  
  
A corner of the energy his grandfather used to remain composed had been enough to scare out an audible gulp.  
  
"Uh...yeah."  
  
"And you know that this particular sword was designed specifically for the defense of home and family."  
  
"Yes, sir." Tenchi hung his head in what he hoped would pass for a bow.  
  
He'd heard his grandfather take a step forward, and prepared to have a lesson knocked into him. To his surprise his grandfather had only taken his hand and ceremoniously closed it around the sword.  
  
"You must treat this instrument as a part of your soul, Tenchi; with the respect and honor it deserves."  
  
With that he'd merely walked away.  
  
Now Tenchi watched as the blue glow returned to its proper place. Never for a moment did he believe his grandfather had been lenient with him, and he'd never called upon the sword again, save for practice on special occasions, and with Seita.  
  
*No wait...I was using the Lighthawk when I-  
  
At the memories of his sixth guest's varied faces Tenchi was ready to shiver rage despite the temperature inside his clothes. But there was no cry for vengeance or whimper of guilt; he felt his grip on the sword loosen as he put it back in its holster without even glancing down. He did not relive his 'mother's' appearance, nor did he see the girls' faces as they lanced themselves to retell their own experiences.  
  
Nonetheless, he thought his reaction appropriate, to experience his emotions shutting down for a moment to observe something he'd hardly even let himself try to understand. He simply thought about Seita's unconscious body, how it had felt when he helped Washu carry it down to the lab. Though his frame remained tall, his body had been as pungent and frail as a stray dog.  
  
Gradually, but formally this time, every guise, as the clever and cultured benefactor, and as the arrogant Ghost of Madness, they all screamed claws out of separate falling cages, smothered under that drained and miserable voice begging for judgment.  
  
With a determined exhale, Tenchi harshly reined in and disciplined his thoughts.  
  
*Snap out of it, Tenchi. I don't care how many times you have to tell  
yourself this but: he's DEAD!  
  
*Washu said that she even atomized the samples she took of him! So come on, think about something else. At least try to get some more firewood ready before it's too dark to see.  
  
Tenchi picked up the axe and positioned his hands with a few resolute breaths. He focused on his teachings again, making sure every blow would count after making sure the next log was smaller.  
  
"Hmph. Maybe grandpa has some ancient---traditional---Jurain wood splitter- --in a different cave somewhere---that he's just---not telling me about." Tenchi sarcastic thoughts spaced themselves between each swing. The log split apart and he smiled, searching quickly for another before he'd even set aside the ready pieces. "Heck---why couldn't I just get Ryoko---to do this---I'm sure she'd have no problem---getting ^her^ soul dirty to-"  
  
Tenchi's first swing into the next log stayed imbedded. He merely stood there holding the axe, a struck and gradually unsettled expression clouding over him. Each thought chanted its way into his head in whispers too hurried and urgent to stop for his mouth or let him breathe. He'd tired of frozen air anyway.  
  
*Ryoko.  
  
*I've hardly said more than two words to her since---'Washu's news'.  
  
*Of course, it almost seems like she's been avoiding me.  
  
*But she's been that way to everyone.  
  
*But I still can't stand it when she acts so...  
  
*'Hopeless'? No, no it can't be that bad. It's more...more like  
she's just 'detached'.  
  
* But she should be getting back to her usual self by now.  
  
With a shake of his head, Tenchi tried to continue where he's left off.  
  
*Maybe she really wanted to do the job herself.  
  
The log came down harder this time, but froze again. This accusing theory shoved in something blunt and heavy to drag its way down his throat. He let go of the axe, it teetered but stayed upright in the log as he reflexively massaged for an obvious lump. The coldest wind yet failed to sting his clenched face as he tried to recycle the idea as soon as possible.  
  
*No.  
  
*She's not really like that.  
  
*And who am I to judge anyway?  
  
*It's not like I'm---'back to normal'---or anything.  
  
*No, this is all probably just her way of dealing with it.  
  
*She'll be okay.  
  
Tenchi lifted the log on his axe and began hammering down again. It was nearly split and nearly impossible to see.  
  
*She should be proud; at least she was able to stand her ground against him.  
  
The axe was getting heavier, and his breaths seemed to be giving more to his thoughts.  
  
*It's strange.  
  
*I was so sure he'd come to me that night for 'recruitment' too.  
  
Two pieces fell on either side of the axe. Tenchi stared blankly at the new notch in the base stump as he relived every agonizing detail of the help he'd walked into. Those shared dreams were supposed to make his final decision easier. They were supposed to relieve him of so much doubt and guilt. But he couldn't help but imagine it as Seita's last strike; to actually make the choice more complicated.  
  
*They both care for me more than any friend I ever thought I'd have.  
  
*But I knew that, right?  
  
*They were both trying to protect ^me^ by not saying anything about Seita.  
  
A helpless grin quivered up Tenchi's face, like a destitute man holding his last silver lining.  
  
*Ryoko, she would try to watch over me no matter what.  
  
*Such dedication...  
  
The second part of his aided vision took every part of a long breath.  
  
*But Aeka, such ^passion^.  
  
*I would have never imagined in a million years that she felt so strongly about me  
  
*It was like her entire soul revolved around mine.  
  
Something similar in size, but impossibly more bitter began rolling down Tenchi's throat again, but he hardly wondered if it was out of place.  
  
*It's like she's already pledged her life to me; all the while being so shy and reserved, but all the while being even crazier about me than-  
  
Tenchi blinked slowly and shook his head again. Running from the decision didn't bring any mental metaphors this time, just a pain that made it to the roots of his teeth this time. He began to gather up the ice- sculpture firewood into its metal basket. It wasn't as heavy as it felt, couldn't be. His eyes closed on the last piece of wood, smooth for having its bark knocked off. Exhausted thoughts ran off to the warmest comfort they could find.  
  
*Aeka, First Princess of Jurai. Out of all the nobles in the galaxy, she would give her life to have my love.  
  
The idea was so instant and intensely comforting, making him forgo lingering feelings of failure for promises of soft hands and sweet eyes, reverently pressed against his chest. There could be no more worrying about who liked who, or whether someone was using someone else. A princess was madly in love with him, one so beautiful that-  
  
His snowcap needed to be adjusted after he shook the perfumed satin clouds from his head. He made himself focus on caring the basket back to the house. It was best not to think too much in any one direction till everyone really started to feel more at home again.  
  
After hurrying back to take the axe in with the firewood basket, Tenchi picked up his step and breathed out a more hopeful and lighthearted thought.  
  
"I hope they saved some dinner for me."  
  
***  
  
Sasami picked up the two dressings and switched their positions on either side of the salad bowl. She straightened a few napkins then sighed back into the kitchen. An idea struck and she turned with a snap of her fingers, happy to remember that she had forgotten something. Her face sank at the sight of the same table, still perfectly set and ready. Mihoshi saw the chef's disappointment and tried to sound reassuring.  
  
"What's wrong, Sasami? Everything's here, and it all looks very nice."  
  
"Thanks Mihoshi, but I still feel like I must be forgetting something." Sasami crossed her arms and frowned at the table.  
  
Ryoko phased in at the end of the table and set herself into a chair without a sound. The movement imitated something weightless rather than graceful. She kept her hands folded in her lap, lethargically pulling her head and shoulders down with them.  
  
"Well there's one thing; we forgot Ryoko." Mihoshi closed her eyes and smiled a ready-made version of her bubbly voice.  
  
Sasami smiled over at Mihoshi like a mother who couldn't tell her child about futility yet, and yet, she sat down adjacent to Ryoko with the mother's smile that would never stop teaching comfort.  
  
"I know you don't like salad much, but I put some pieces of ham in it."  
  
Ryoko coughed numbly, perhaps replying, perhaps just letting her throat gargle up whatever sound might suit. A tiny leak of air and she swallowed with obvious difficulty but bored pain. Sasami leaned forward invisibly and opened her eyes a little wider, making sure she wasn't seeing something stranger than her friend.  
  
Oil and grime weighted Ryoko's hair with a sickly gloss. Telling herself not to pinch her steadily wrinkling nose, Sasami looked down and noticed that the thicker winter kimono was significantly wrinkled and darkened in a number of places.  
  
She remembered the men she'd seen while shopping with Tenchi's father, emaciated and grizzled around their rag clothing. What had stuck in her mind was not the way Mr. Misaki walked past, taking care to ignore their hands and hold Sasami's tighter, but the less visible ones, perfectly motionless in tattered sleeping bag cocoons. She'd told herself that they just preferred to sleep during the day, but couldn't be certain that they were really sleeping at all.  
  
Now, as she looked at her brave friend, she began feeling desperate to stop thinking about them.  
  
"Well ^there^ you are, Ryoko!"  
  
Aeka strode over with a dishtowel crumpling into her hands. She sat down roughly in the chair across from Sasami, also adjacent to Ryoko. The towel slapped onto the table before she even pulled her chair in. Normally she would have taken off her kitchen apron before coming to the table, but it seemed to go unnoticed as she leveled the mother of all uneven-distribution- of-labor glares.  
  
"How nice of you to join us."  
  
Her sarcasm killed any trace of true hospitality and all but killed itself in the process. Unable to get gratification from staring anger into an unkempt mass, she busied her eyes by removing her royal tiara and a special cloth from her sleeve. She spoke again in the same tone, unaffected by the rapid polishing the nearly invisible headpiece required.  
  
"We certainly couldn't have prepared everything without your help."  
  
A sway in Ryoko's hair came as the only sign of life, presumably caused by small breaths and not a smaller draft. Aeka moved her eyes over like a tank's turret, snapping them back when the target made nothing resembling a threat. From the look she ground into her headpiece it was the filthiest thing in Jurain history. Fancy-frail wood tested its imitation of a wishbone.  
  
"Ryoko, we all try to do our part around here. If you don't want to speak to me that's more than fine as far as I'm concerned." Aeka restrained some anger, but forced the rest to show its force in soft tones.  
  
"But I don't think it's too much to ask for you to simply ^try^ to help out around here."  
  
Sasami and Mihoshi sank and recoiled but couldn't look away. Washu watched the front door hopefully, till she remembered that Nobuyuki wouldn't be coming through for another few hours. And so, with even more urgency, she turned to the back door; Tenchi should have been back by now. And thus, when she looked back at her daughter, draining lines began to scrawl her face. Even after she closed her eyes the mark of desperation remained. Her attempt at telepathy would have been obvious to anyone.  
  
*Ryoko.  
  
*Ryoko, please talk to me.  
  
Nothing, a static and smoke imitation of the machinations normally echoing in her daughter's head even when she was shutting her out. It should have at least been more abrasive, but she figured there wasn't enough force behind things. In any case Aeka was already turning indifference into too much violence to ignore.  
  
Despite the dishtowel, condiments and utensils rattled as Aeka slammed her headpiece against the table, all but baring her teeth.  
  
"Damn it, Ryoko! Is this your latest tactic to infuriate me?! I know you haven't gone deaf, or mute, or anything but sulky! We all have a right to still be upset---but we all have a responsibility to acknowledge that there are other people living in this house!"  
  
Aeka needed a quick breath to continue the lecture's force, giving Sasami enough to throw a surprised but nonetheless hurt expression.  
  
" But, Aeka, Tenchi said we should all eat without him-" Her voice pleaded almost inaudibly, but loud enough for Aeka to redirect her anger in a flash.  
  
"Stay out of this, Sasami!"  
  
Pain quickly shocked young eyes open too wide to hold up, and the little princess began to imitate the accused. Aeka had already turned back with no more remorse than needed to scold an insolent kitchen drudge.  
  
"Now answer me, Ryoko! I want to know right now: are you just going to stay like this for the rest of your miserable days? Just wander around half-alive without any regard for anyone?"  
  
If it could have been a response then it also could have been a small amount of hair changing position; but Ryoko's head seemed to sink a little lower. Her face finally tightened enough to turn red, Aeka nearly shouted now as she leaned over the table to force a bit of eye contact.  
  
"Do you think everyone should have to adjust to how rotten ^you^ feel, that you can just shanghai us all on your little self-pity trip?! It's over Ryoko! If you can't push out the thought of---of all THAT, then maybe you're better off somewhere else!"  
  
Her chair felt its age as she forcefully realigned her posture, at first her closed eyes and deep breathing seemed to promise some kind of closure or abandonment, but Washu's mouth tightened as she saw Aeka do the same.  
  
The First Princess tasted something sour, but chose to enslave the flavor rather than endure it. A piece of cruelty crept up her throat like phlegm, ready to strike, then ready to drip onto Ryoko's head in a calmly disgusted string.  
  
"Are you ^really^ so wallowed in yourself? Do you need Washu to reexamine that head of yours?" Aeka turned in Washu's direction then turned back to Ryoko too quick to meet the scientist's sunken, but truly frightened gaze.  
  
"How about it, Little Washu?" Aeka asked Ryoko. "Do you have any pills that might turn her into a civil human being for at least one evening?"  
  
Washu merely tried to look under her daughter's hair again, eyes still pleading.  
  
*Please, you have to stop this.  
  
The white noise that replied wasn't any louder, but had finally grown significantly more abrasive. The scientist felt alone before a hostile crowd, hoping the last megaphone could keep it from becoming a mob.  
  
*Ryoko. Daughter. I'll do anything I can...anything you want, just please talk to us!  
  
Obviously not really expecting an answer from Washu, Aeka threw one last spiteful glare in hopes that Ryoko would raise her head in time to catch it. She exhaled once for frustration, then again for failure. But when she spoke again, ready to wash her hands of the unmoved and unresponsive parasite, her haughtiness began to waver. Pain confused and bloated with too many conflicting mixtures, her lecturer's podium began to waver.  
  
"I hate that we can't be allies in this, Ryoko," ready to cry for half a second, Aeka quickly pored another layer of concrete to stand on, "but if you can't deal with life then that's ^your^ problem."  
  
She sat still for a minute after another, nostrils flaring at the murdered air above their table, before picking up her headpiece and polishing it more gently, elbows held in close to formal. If she could finally see herself in its shine, then that was her right and no one else's.  
  
"It's really no wonder that Tenchi prefers my company lately...and no wonder that Seita took such a liking to you."  
  
Ryoko's chair fell back, struck the floor, and bounced to crack thunder again before dying with a wooden scratch. The former pirate was standing tall, looking down her right arm and the blazing length of her sword to Aeka's frozen profile. The movement had been so fast that she was still holding her headpiece and its cloth in both hands. She was still looking at it as well, though her eyes were much larger. The rest of the family stared first at the sword before they could decide which end of it to focus on.  
  
It was obvious to at least one of them: with the power-converting headpiece removed it was only the last microsecond of Ryoko's restraint that had kept Aeka from losing her head like a dandelion blossom. And by the way the sword vibrated, it was a macrocosm of will that was letting her keep it.  
  
"Come on, Aeka." Hushed and vaporized, so much acid could force itself through so many needles.  
  
The princess's eyes slid down her nose then off to the side, making sure Ryoko's sword was as close as it felt. They began ascending the nearly blinding glow, the clawed grip trembling an impossible frequency, the crushed line over pale lips, and finally into a white gold to explode suns.  
  
Rage could not be so focused, Aeka reasoned, then imagined the face Kagato had tasted and Seita had swallowed. But the moment she leapt to this conclusion she instantly fell into it; petrified for real to see something like that blue insanity gleaming down on her without any want of presentation.  
  
"Say it." Apparently waiting for the precise moment when the princess braved her attacker's face, Ryoko's precision exacted to a hiss.  
  
"R-R-Ryoko-" Aeka's neck began to pull instinctively away as she tried to stammer out a response.  
  
"You've wanted to say it for months now. Well go on." The increased force released a horrid rasp, then descended and twisted itself sharper.  
  
"Tell me I'm just---like---HIM!"  
  
Clenched fangs flashed, but Ryoko quickly sealed her lips again, vibrating her sword a few centimeters closer. Sasami could see a red gleam on the sweat of her sister's neck. When Aeka winced and gasped at the sound of lightly singed flesh, the younger princess sprang out of her chair; another one knocked to the floor.  
  
"Ryoko, don't! Please!" The desperate cry finished with pitifully struggling sounds as Washu reached out and restrained her with more force than Sasami could have budged, if she'd thought about it.  
  
"Stay back!" Washu's own shout didn't sound like it had the force to back up the small arms still securing the futile struggle. And she was still securing it till the very last of the miniscule twitches brought Ryoko's face over them.  
  
From what might have been her mother to what could have been her sister, she tore herself into both ends of betrayal. Her sword began to lower, and as she looked back at her prisoner her loathing began to invert.  
  
Aeka was still too petrified to take any sort of hope from the water welling up in her would-be murderer's eyes. The first tear fell with no more recognition than a bead of sweat, but managed to remain trembling on Ryoko's chin. Justice dissipated with a fading sparkle, but the executioner's arm remained at relatively the same angle, clutching for alms or something invisible. Just as Washu began to ease her hold on Sasami, Ryoko stepped back, pulling both hands up to her head as it wilted towards the floor.  
  
They could all still clearly see her eyes this time, and tried to be ready for her to pull the sky down into a scream. But still silent, knees began to bend as quick breaths were sucked in for dry sobs.  
  
"^Ryoko^." Sasami reached a hand out supportively, but was still too frightened to bring it close enough for any contact.  
  
They watched her nearly pull her head into her shoulders before she faded away, and they remained staring in the same direction for a number of minutes. Winter surrounded them with gentle winds and death unashamed without its mask. A few more minutes and Tenchi's hearty footsteps were shaking up the porch.  
  
He used his bent elbows and the wood basket to work the door open and didn't notice the fallen chairs till after he'd shut it. The rosy cheer of his escape froze and crumbled to the ground within a few moments of scanning the dining room. All eyes shied from him as he ignored them, unblinking on an empty place at the table.  
  
"Where's Ryoko?"  
  
***  
  
The mountains threw back her name from out its crevices and over its swells. It had been a shock to run back out into the cold after barely a minute inside, but Tenchi still felt even stranger for having committed to finding someone when he'd no idea where to look. And it remained 'no idea' for a while after the only idea refused to share space. Once fully obscured by the forest, he finally stopped denying so that he could start arguing.  
  
*I knew something like this was going to happen.  
  
*But did I do anything to stop it?  
  
*Noooooo.  
  
Mihoshi and Sasami were staying close together, but calling out from opposite directions. Their voices echoed more despairingly than his, and each time they rose up he wanted to call out again, maybe to drown them out, maybe to make sure he found her first. But these thoughts just made him more determined to keep the rest of his pace in silence. He knew she wasn't going to answer anyone even more clearly than he knew where to find her.  
  
The industrial strength flashlight made a painful glare in the snow, and he had to experiment with different angles as he snapped branches and dodged stones. A few stumbles and a few moments of blindness only doubled the curses beneath his freezing breath. He only hoped this trek would take long enough for him to sort details, and maybe even form a plan.  
  
Tenchi's head hermit crabbed back into his jacket. The innocent voices were getting farther away, still yet to be joined by either Washu or Aeka.  
  
*'Ryoko and Aeka had a fight'---no kidding Mihoshi, but could you tell me why the only damage was a few upturned chairs, or why Aeka looked scared out of her wits?  
  
Ready to grind his teeth the rest of the way, he quickly realized he was misplacing his anger, then helplessly accepted that he'd no idea where to place it.  
  
*Who am I so angry at?  
  
*I don't even know who started it.  
  
A particularly large branch would have bent for him, but he decided to break it anyway.  
  
*And how do I still 'know' where she'll be?  
  
*I mean, why the hell would she ever want to go there again?  
  
*The last place we'd look?  
  
Tenchi stopped to catch his breath, then realized he wasn't as tired as he'd thought. He should keep going, any second now. There, pick up the pace.  
  
*Yeah, well, just what am ^I^ gonna say if I find her?  
  
*'Ryoko, come inside before you catch a chill'.  
  
*She's probably less likely to freeze out here than I am.  
  
The ground beneath the snow was so firm where Tenchi slammed his feet to a stop that he almost jumped back. He held onto a frozen sapling, bending to suck in more freezing air than his hushed thought needed.  
  
"What---what am I doing?"  
  
A tail of wind nearly whipped tears into his eyes, but everything else was silent. The other girls' voices might be lost under the force of his breathing, and his heart might be pounding for more than the task of ascending a snowy mountain.  
  
"Ryoko," Tenchi closed his eyes and took a long moment to calm himself, "you'd better be there."  
  
***  
  
Washu picked up one chair and pushed it in with the same robotic movements she'd used for the other. Aeka was still staring at her headpiece, tangled in the polishing cloth like a restless sleeper in their sheets.  
  
Neither had spoken as Tenchi entered, nor when Sasami and Mihoshi went chasing after him. When the only signs of a struggle had been erased, Washu merely held on to the chair, looking down at Ryoko's empty plate.  
  
"Washu," Aeka haunted evenly.  
  
Washu stopped breathing and blinked before looking over at the royal profile, low enough not to risk eye contact.  
  
"She---she was really going to kill me," being so brave finally made her frail, "wasn't she?"  
  
Without a mouth, Washu reached over and began to pile up Ryoko's untouched place settings. Aeka waited till she was back from the kitchen to speak again.  
  
"Did you try to stop her?"  
  
Washu began to gather up her own utensils in a similar matter, answering directly, though flesh and bone were none of her business.  
  
"You mean more than speaking to her? No."  
  
Aeka closed her eyes and began to realign her headpiece in slow uncertain movements. She looked down at the cloth in her hands and began to wring it.  
  
"Is she---is she-" Aeka tried to force it, then wished she could take it back as she knew Washu would fill in the rest. Her first tears couldn't find an apology in regret.  
  
Little Washu took her own empty plate into the kitchen.  
  
"Washu, is Tenchi going to find her, or...will you have to?" Aeka gambled a sudden compromise when she saw the red crown returning, presumably for the other plates.  
  
"Sasami is still with Mihoshi, I suggest you try to make sure she isn't out there too long." Washu replied as she passed the table for the couches, slowly bringing her laptop up to date.  
  
Aeka stared at the polishing cloth or nothing for a time before slowly and dutifully rising from her seat.  
  
***  
  
The entrance was fenced with snow. Tenchi used a large branch like a cement trowel to gradually scrape enough away for a entrance. Before his first step he smiled down at the flashlight, gripping it tighter and numbly relieving himself for keeping it dry. The pitch inside the cave glimmered with tiny patches of frost as he swung the light around, letting it fall on the iron gate, then approaching with the beam steadied on the lock as if that might unfasten or melt it.  
  
His long sigh of exasperation clouded into the light like a tested stage effect. He looked down, then hung his head and let himself fall forward so that the cold iron could give him some hearty discipline for his forgetfulness. The gate smarted for a moment, but yielded a strained groan rather than a resilient rattle.  
  
Tenchi almost fell forward as his head pushed the door open.  
  
Shock took him a step back, hardly believing that he'd left it unlocked all this time. Had he left it unlocked? Has his grandfather? Had vandals broken in? Tenchi let such questions present their claims all at once, making it easier to dismiss them altogether when he began his second steps inside. Though the path was so far free of hazards, he kept looking up when he wasn't carefully unfastening the sword from his belt.  
  
*I can't even remember if I'm going to need this again.  
  
*Am I going to have to slide down there on ice this time?  
  
*She has to have heard me coming by now.  
  
*But I can't hear a thing down there.  
  
When he arrived at the end, where the rock had parted for him, he had avoided feeling anything to see it closed. He looked from one hand to the other, from the flashlight to the sword. Neither seemed to offer any comfort, and the gulp definitely made things worse.  
  
*At least this rules out vandals...unless they got caught down there somehow and are a now just a bunch of mummies with spray paint and beer bottles and-  
  
Tenchi shook his head roughly.  
  
*Snap out of it Tenchi---now how did I get this thing open.  
  
***  
  
"Where could she be?!" Sasami cried as she ran down from a small vantage point near the front gate to the house.  
  
Mihoshi bent a little to lay her hands reassuringly on Sasami's shoulders. Her teeth were chattering but she quickly set them together.  
  
"She'll be okay, Sasami. I don't think it'll snow again tonight."  
  
The paling to red face pulled away, looking hurt and a little angered.  
  
"I'm not worried about her catching a cold, I---I just want to make sure she's okay." The words fell away in timid clouds as Sasami hung her head and sniffed roughly.  
  
The professional shielded the wind from her eyes then stood on her tiptoes for a wider search.  
  
"^She sure seemed lively enough to me^."  
  
She had whispered to the self beneath her breath, but quickly regretted even thinking it when she looked back down at Sasami's widened eyes.  
  
"Mihoshi, you don't think Aeka meant what she said, do you?" The fear in Sasami's eyes cut in like a falling icicle, making her crouch down to eye level with the younger princess. It fully dawned on her for the first time that she didn't have so far to go anymore.  
  
"Of course not, Sasami. She was just frustrated, I guess---they both were." Mihoshi tried to finish with a smile and stand up straight again. "Come on, we'll never find her if we just stand here. Well, probably not, anyway."  
  
Sasami tried to smile for a moment, but a thick frown began to drag her head back toward her boots, sending a shiver back up.  
  
"Sasami? What's wrong?"  
  
"What if she doesn't want us to find her?!" The younger princess exploded into tears, burrowing into Mihoshi and nearly knocking her over.  
  
"Sasami," she held on tightly in her own pained confusion, "don't say that, we're her friends."  
  
"How do you know?" Sasami's muffled sob was just audible enough.  
  
Mihoshi's already weak smile deflated to a crumple. For a few moments they tried just standing there, silent as snowmen. When Aeka called out to her sister from the house, Mihoshi looked up with teary but slightly relieved eyes.  
  
***  
  
The simplest answer wasn't always the best, or the first to be considered, but Tenchi wasn't in any mood to question good fortune, or dumb luck. He'd held the sword up to the stones and willed for them to part, trying not to show that he even imagined it would work. It was harder not to celebrate when he saw the descending ramp, with the water gone from its rectangular stones.  
  
By the time he'd perfected the tactic of using the butt of the flashlight to steady himself as he waddled down he was a quarter done with his possible list of numbed places. He could see more of a faint light at the bottom, but still couldn't hear anything. Stopping in an attempt to redirect some blood to his left knee, the careful stretch lifted his jacket pocket and dropped the sword hilt. Tenchi let the flashlight go and grabbed the ancient device with both hands.  
  
For a few speeding seconds he was glad his rear had been one of the first things on the list.  
  
The thump of his final landing shrunk his entire body into itself as the flashlight bounced to take another crack at the floor. It scratched, rattled, and finally rolled in a half circle toward the large elevated pool in the center of the chamber. Tenchi didn't think to check for damages, he merely stared, following the shadow over him to Ryoko's back.  
  
Sitting sideways at the lip of her tomb, legs bent together and arms pressing down in front, it looked comfortable only for the flexible. The pose reminded Tenchi of some old western painting with a hyper-feminine girl admiring her reflection in a park fountain. Ryoko's wide hair almost fit the image of the big hats Americans wore in those days.  
  
She wasn't huddling into herself to fight the cold that had even managed to penetrate this far, and he couldn't hear her crying, and he couldn't tell if she'd heard him arrive. Thus he looked at her with a renewed, but entirely different fear. For too long the difference between a mummy and a ghost kept him more still than he could be and paler than any jacket could help.  
  
"Ryoko?" Tenchi whispered not to loosen a shower of huge stalactites.  
  
No answer. With extreme caution, and a renewed knowledge of the pain in his joints, Tenchi rose and tried again. His voice grabbed at some sense of calm for both of them.  
  
"Ryoko, what are you doing down here?"  
  
He walked forward with a breath for every step, looked down at the flashlight, and stepped over it lightly, then lighter till he stood where he might sit next to her. Tenchi tried to keep his eyes on her wilted hair and not on whatever he might see if he looked into that tomb again.  
  
"C'mon Ryoko, can we please just talk about whatever happened, I promise I'm not mad at anyone."  
  
No response, and no sign of breathing, and there was no way he could have kept himself from looking back. The only way out would probably be easier to climb without the water. His shadow next to hers wavered slightly amid a chilling sound. He didn't want to turn back either way, but the circular sound reeled him regardless.  
  
She was lazily stirring the whiter-than-paint water, small ripples hardly affected its luminescence.  
  
"Ryoko."  
  
Tenchi shocked himself with the frailty in his voice, how a new boulder could sink down his throat so slowly without snapping anything. Terror was as real as ever in the moment that she actually ^couldn't^ hear him, and wasn't enough in the next.  
  
"I could have killed you that day."  
  
The stones were still cold after she crushed them in her fists, and the apathy in this was curious.  
  
"You weren't quite up to speed. You were-" she let her hand dangle motionless in the water, "very frail."  
  
Enough fluid dripped from her withdrawn fingers to imitate a fountain, a leaky sink, and the last drops of sake. She thumbed the tips but didn't shake them out.  
  
"And if I wanted to---I could probably kill you now."  
  
Tenchi's memories were fighting with the instincts to the envy of Berserkers, but the battle was entirely muted, hushed for whatever sliver of wind might escape between Ryoko's teeth and burrow into his throat.  
  
"People would scream, and cry. Some of them would want me dead.  
  
"But that's all."  
  
Instinct enslaved the vanquished and eased Tenchi's eyes over to Ryoko's other hand. For a moment he thought he saw a small square of folded paper between her index and middle finger, but she closed it in a fist before he could be sure. Folding both arms tightly against her stomach, the flexible reflector turned to sit full on her rear with knees bent too far out to lean against, or catch her slouching head. The new posture interrupted the next instinct fighting for Tenchi's strongest hand.  
  
"Ryoko."  
  
Serious fear might make the jump to serious concern in the next breath.  
  
"What are you talking about?"  
  
Almost.  
  
She sat there unresponsive while Tenchi tried to hear a good sign in that his ears had adjusted to the tiniest ripples in the water, his breath, and hers.  
  
"Tenchi, think back to that night---at your school."  
  
With instinct distracted by a fear surpassing his, even in its restraint, Tenchi's memory came back vivid and detailed. The mad dashes had been painless till he paused them, the explosions should have singed his hairs, and he should have fainted after the surreal conclusion.  
  
*Does she actually feel guilty about all that?  
  
"Ryoko," Tenchi began tentatively, putting everything into reflex humor "about the school; they already rebuilt all the damaged parts."  
  
He forced a smile but only felt a gulp.  
  
"And they needed a new science lab, anyway."  
  
Silent and unmoving for a moment, Ryoko continued, at least confirming that she could hear him.  
  
"I meant before all that."  
  
A chill raised Tenchi's skin into his jacket that her tone hadn't been an accident and wasn't going to change. Helpless or oblivious, he let his gaze wander fully into the pool. He remembered the mummy that had risen from it, grabbing him and bringing his life closer. The ether of her moans, the piercing wails of energy from the sword; the sounds kept the images welded fast. And as he waited to be free of that narrow escape he forgot to guard against an easy comparison; the empty white pool looked so much like one of Seita's portals.  
  
*Don't think about ^him^, Tenchi! Say something!  
  
"Ryoko, I'm sorry, its just---I was afraid, I didn't really expect for there to be someone down here." He nearly had to gargle it out, but almost felt ready to attempt sense, or at least reassurance by the next breath.  
  
Ryoko remained unmoved and would have cut him off, just the same.  
  
"No Tenchi, right after that."  
  
"What---what do you mean?" Genuine confusion afforded him a few blinks, but Ryoko stole his blood right back the way she'd begun.  
  
"Do you remember how we ended up alone on that roof together?"  
  
"I---I feel asleep, and when I woke up everyone was-"  
  
"Do you usually sleep so deeply at school?"  
  
"Well no I-"  
  
"Tenchi, I made it so you wouldn't hear the sound of the bell."  
  
The choke in Ryoko's voice attached a hook to each of his lungs, and chains, and an iceberg. For the space between his skin he wanted to think about meaning, yet the space within his bones needed all the support they could get. Tenchi was able to pull his eyes from the pool and keep them on Ryoko with relative ease.  
  
"I made it so that you'd only hear the wind while you dozed off."  
  
Calm returned with an iron jaw; she'd make her point without retreating, and if it killed her it was of no consequence. Any of his pitiful confusion would be ignored.  
  
"But how did-"  
  
"Then---" Ryoko bent further inward and shivered like someone exerting nearly all their strength, "then do you remember---just before I revealed myself to you---that little cat."  
  
Tenchi wouldn't breathe, but Ryoko couldn't be this upset. He didn't understand, and had to ask if he'd want to.  
  
"You bent down to pet it."  
  
Memories and instincts killed each other to make way for a revelation, even though Tenchi felt horribly unprepared for it.  
  
"And it disappeared."  
  
Someone cut the chains and let in the cold, needling through his coat and into his soft flesh.  
  
"It was never there Tenchi---I---I ^made you see it^."  
  
Tenchi knew every sensation as the sparks and acid fell from Ryoko, a miracle machine wailing beneath the hammer. But there was no cry of injustice, for mercy. The heat was slow and white as it cauterized nerves together rather than bind them, paralyzing him just the same. The common heritage Ryoko shared with Seita rose out of the earth like a hellish icon. Understanding felt helpless, but he had no blood and nowhere to go till he could speak, till she was out of breath.  
  
Ryoko continued, still shaking, cruel to the world that she was not yet crying.  
  
"I---I just wanted to make a big first impression with you."  
  
Again she should have been growing closer to tears, but instead climbed farther from air.  
  
"I've always hated making illusions more than almost anything else Kagato made me do."  
  
At last her posture began to fold, knees folding in slow to catch her forehead. In his throat, Tenchi could feel how tightly she was closing her eyes.  
  
"I hadn't for a long time, even before I met up with your grandfather. It takes a lot of concentration, but I can still do it. I bet even Washu knows that I could probably make illusions almost as good as- "  
  
Fists trembled and eyes contracted, but everything stayed dry. Tenchi, however, might have marveled at the sweat gathered when he pulled his palm over his face. He couldn't remember telling himself to move so much, and as he looked down at every crease in his hand he noticed it was red enough to be raw for forgetting to put his gloves back on.  
  
*So that's what this is about.  
  
The cave would be too warm for a jacket soon, but Tenchi could only think of the cowering emptiness left in his mind where the next thought should have been. He should have some of any idea within the next moments. He should feel like the hardest part was over.  
  
"Now do you see, Tenchi?"  
  
*She's standing up. Oh God, she's standing up!  
  
Tenchi moved at a little more than the same pace, turning to face what was rising to face him. And though she wasn't bringing her gaze above his knees, he could see her face entirely, one half vivid in the light of the tomb. He'd been ready to be petrified, but a crippling pity was far worse. The weight against him had rotted notches into itself, grinding against him with every detail draining and stretching the yellow tar of her eyes underneath her skin.  
  
"Aeka's been right all along." Sickly strings of amusement fell from her calm like oily cobwebs, shaken off by her first, then second step toward him. Her hands fell slowly to her sides when she stopped within arm's reach.  
  
"It's only going to get worse. I'm going to keep drinking and hiding until- "  
  
She closed her eyes on uncertainty. Her breath was hot and pungent when it grabbed him by the collar.  
  
Tenchi listened to the same childish cry twitch itself into a ball for him to say anything that might make everything okay again. He wanted to end its suffering almost enough to call out his own cowardice.  
  
All things aside; she was going to finish her sentence soon, this was the last chance for him to run.  
  
Ryoko beat her whimper flat, gulping to mock any nausea, and opening her eyes just like she had strength.  
  
"I don't trust myself anymore, I look around and the whole world seems rotted out."  
  
Desperation had its moments, even if they were regrettable in the next. Tenchi managed to think back to the unity he'd felt when they'd embraced each other after fully sharing their battles. Everyone had cried on everyone, but seeing the bitterest rivals together had been the worst. Nobody had forced them, nor had they acknowledged them; they'd looked so frail and fearful, drifting limply apart rather than emerging cleansed.  
  
Explosions of red energy burst in, twisting him till his skin felt ready to crumple off like wrapping paper. Something please save him before he started begging.  
  
"Nothing seems worth doing, but I still manage to do plenty of damage." Ryoko was lifting her eyes into his, but as she shook even more Tenchi could tell her voice was impossibly steadying.  
  
"Sometimes I feel like, any day now, it's going to be too late."  
  
Tenchi's thoughts stopped bothering to breathe; if she was going to make a significant decision now while of less than sound mind, then she was. The dreams he'd seen hadn't changed shape, and if he let them fall from his fingers they wouldn't wilt and wouldn't grow. He wanted to know why she was doing this to him but knew best that he was still too afraid to ask.  
  
"I have an idea though."  
  
The softness was drastic but not unexpected as she picked up his hand by the wrist and used it to pull part of his jacket back. Tenchi felt his blood tighten everywhere but beneath the touch.  
  
"Maybe there's a way for everyone to be safe."  
  
Ryoko used her new tool like a pair of tongs to remove the sword, delicate hands like ice as she made him tighten his grip on the hilt. She lifted her head, eyes closing before they would have caught his. The two remaining gems glowed or caught the light as she pulled the sword at her exposed neck.  
  
"Put me back, Tenchi. Please, if you know what's good for you, take my gem and set me in that pool again. I'll just go to sleep."  
  
Tenchi's eyes widened at the sword, then back up at her. The weight died and crumbled in his throat, burying the rest of him in its rubble. The surreal gravity of what she was asking struck him over and through, but he didn't feel it, only the cruel irony in a base reflex to make sure he'd actually heard her.  
  
"Who knows---" she began trembling again, one tear line on each side, neither with any real hope of meeting at the edges of a slow smile, "maybe after another 700 years I'll be okay."  
  
Almost too far in for him to know, Tenchi senses of compassion and forgiveness burned against each other. He clenched two years of memory, every color of experience with the beautiful demon he'd accidentally unleashed. And for the first time since Aeka's arrival he considered what their relationship might have been without the princess. Nothing came to him but the weight, mortaring itself back together.  
  
Inevitably the most recent events took over, her unpredictable, volatile personality remaining the only constant. In light of what had driven them both back to their meeting place he considered it, at last feeling blood again. His grandfather might not have wanted him to get the keys after all.  
  
The silence in his throat remained unwavering till his initial indecisiveness finally came full circle, leaving him to stare down at the sword and the being behind it without any hope of action.  
  
Tenchi let the cave go dead again, muted beneath the throbbing in his head, empty till at last Ryoko took great care to lower her head, and let her hand slip away. She held its wrist and turned her head to follow their long shadows from the wall to the floor.  
  
"I'll take that as a 'no'."  
  
Tenchi lowered his own hand, turning the sword sideways and looking down at it, numbed with disbelief at the continued link of memories between Ryoko and the last of Seita. He didn't feel any more capable of looking at her eyes than his.  
  
"Since I can't do it myself I guess we'll have to figure something else out." She turned and sat back down facing the pool, cross-legged, her back relatively straight.  
  
It took him more than another moment to remind himself that a less than lifeless voice was no clear sign of anything. His feet felt new, or on loan from someone else, but shockingly functional. He turned toward her despite himself.  
  
"You can go now Tenchi, I'll be out soon enough. Tell everyone not to worry."  
  
Something like exhaustion took over his reflexes and did as he was told. A few steps from the exit, he stopped and looked over his shoulder, just as the weight had sharpened and commanded.  
  
She hadn't changed.  
  
Forced or not, he didn't consider, it was all he could do to make it up the painful ascent; retelling himself that he'd done all he could eventually matched the pace of his breathing.  
  
---  
  
Alongside the modified cryogenic chamber of Prince Yosho's once grand ship, his first and only prisoner looked down at more than enough light and no reflection. Amid the captured chaos it took to reassure herself of everyone's everything the press of colder air was hardly a concern. She unfolded and held up a small piece of paper, looking through the pitifully smudged drawing to the fingertip shadows behind it. With her other hand she pointed a small drop of energy.  
  
Her quivering hands haloed the falling ashes, a wide and wider smile shook the next tears loose and caught them perfectly. 


	2. Verse Twelve is Reflection

Standard Disclaimer:  
  
I thank all the owners of the Tenchi characters who have chosen not to sue me for suggesting some alternative uses for them.  
  
Standard Advertisement:  
  
I thank all the readers who have perused my other submissions and favorite authors.  
  
Standard Procedure:  
  
Form alliances that can be called upon in times of crisis.  
  
Tenchi Muyo: Sanctuary and Asylum  
  
-Verse Twelve is Reflection-  
  
***  
  
By choice, or belittle. Be well, and bygone.  
  
But bolder, thus beseeched. But balanced, so be strong.  
  
-ZJS  
  
***  
  
When the futility of a grudge becomes as apparent as death there is often a reluctance born from its bleached remains. In such cases where justice is denied for lack of a faulted party it can emerge as a miser's reflex, a fortune built up high to provide a vantage point from which to measure another's growth. Yet whenever two opponents survey the end of a common threat something entirely different may emerge. This aftermath hesitation, akin to an awkward pall, can easily grow to beautiful melancholy, or crippling doubt, as two forces find themselves still together, standing side by side for what might as well be the first time in their long memories.  
  
They would both know that they both saw the same opportunity: to become allies, or to accept that their opposition runs deeper than they'd thought, if they'd thought. Often it takes some greater ideal, or concept of objectivity, to turn one to face the other. If there were room for honor it might be simpler, as it never is when the distribution has already been assumed predetermined, and discarded.  
  
And so it was with two sisters, overlooking a conceivable end to a previously inconceivable threat. They remained at a loss as to when the emerging changes would signal a return to their respective and distant places. Knowing that this, their reluctance, was shared, and knowing better that neither wished to speak of it, these blood-bonded women offered each other a slight glance. Shimmering inversion, as eyes and mirrors do, they decided for their own reasons not to waste all the time they had on such a silence.  
  
Naturally the more ambitious of them took her nature first.  
  
---  
  
*It seems she has underestimated the rate---the reach of his decay.  
  
*If ever she estimated.  
  
*...  
  
*So would you now explain why you left the evaluation to her?  
  
*Surprised?  
  
*I hope to be pleased.  
  
*You've always hoped for too much.  
  
*I've always hoped.  
  
*Then you may be disappointed with my motivation.  
  
*I may.  
  
*But you may also find hope, as you may find fundamental connections between siblings after all.  
  
*Oh?  
  
*It seems quite possible, that giving him the slow, rather than swift end, was as much her preference as mine.  
  
*I see. If I find no hope, and no surprise in that, would you forgive me?  
  
*I ask nothing of you; do me the same courtesy.  
  
*Then are we best parted now, perhaps forever again?  
  
*There is no answer to that, as it was never more than circumstance that brought us so near.  
  
*Are you still set on bringing our sister back and over to you, or has the loss of your champion changed those plans.  
  
*Do not think you are in any higher a position simply because your champion remains.  
  
*My champion remains, he lives, but he still believes that he lives without me. Your champion, however, did already give his life for you.  
  
*He merely destroyed himself to destroy that---abomination.  
  
*Oh, are we even now to avoid his name, even after he went through so much trouble to reveal it? And now that it is a memory, shouldn't you have fully regained your precious confidence?  
  
---  
  
And she felt gentler things sicken a little as she lost herself that moment, as she turned her own wisdom into snide violence, lashing out at her own blood as she swore she would not do.  
  
Her own blood merely waited out the shock, hoping the regretful attacker would still have regret to twist when they resettled themselves.  
  
Yet, for any reason, they were on equal footing again when the moment passed. So thus the ambition resumed.  
  
---  
  
*At least my only regret is that I was not able to use him properly.  
  
*Just as I would not pride myself on something so regrettable.  
  
*...So, after all this you really are entirely unchanged. Indeed I remain the greater of us then; ever progressing, endurance after endurance, ever increasing my power rather than merely coddling it, ever-  
  
*Yes, ever unchanged.  
  
*...Fair enough.  
  
*Your concept of fair play does not interest me, I only want to know if you'll stay on to see the game through.  
  
*See it through? Why sister, hasn't it ended already?  
  
*Even if you're only asking me to ask myself: it shows some doubt in you.  
  
*And whether you're more afraid of my participation or abandonment: it shows some fear in you.  
  
*Have you still not learned which is more destructive? Do you still only regret---lost opportunities for power?  
  
---  
  
The smallest chuckles could be despairing enough.  
  
---  
  
*...  
  
*Hasn't there been enough joyless laughter already?  
  
---  
  
The sharpness of smoke echoes best through post-physical planes. Choking plumes curled out like glamour from the furnace of her throat. Minds throughout the universe, already dedicated to spite and greed, glowed white hot for their moments, for twisting blows beneath the black hammer of her laughter.  
  
And her sister only waited for her to accept responsibility for the fruits of power, quiet till they both were, then listening again.  
  
---  
  
*What then, are you tempted to call me into a comparison, to call me what our dear distant little relative has already called herself?  
  
*The game is ^not^ yet over, and there is thus no place for cruelty, and she is not so very distant.  
  
*I was only referring to the distance she has taken for herself.  
  
---  
  
And the meeker sister offered a smile to speak over all the confrontation she'd allowed, its delivery taking more time than its preparation.  
  
---  
  
*Perhaps you give up too easily.  
  
---  
  
Returning to their respective positions, two sisters watched in silence as they always could, beside each other as they'd never been.  
  
***  
  
Morning sun struck the icicles on the Masaki home and for a moment turned glass delicacies into crystal teeth. Thinning blankets of snow screamed back at the shadows and reassured every sleeping tree that the sun had not left them. A few patches of ice cracked impatient and futile at the lake's edge, mocked by the wind's unaffected laughter, lorded over by a clock's trumpet.  
  
Tenchi sat up and watched the time, but mostly the faintly blinking icon punctuating it, his eyes heavy and halfway between re-setting, or daring it, just ^daring^ it to go off again. After scratching a few places and stretching a few more, he carried the rest of the mess downstairs.  
  
Sasami was up already, sitting on the couch in her sleep robe and bent over a whimpering stream. Ryo-ohki didn't give any protest to the tight embrace, seeming to show support by imitating a pillow. Mihoshi was up as well and in the same low posture with a protective arm stretched gently around the young princess. She looked up at the sound of Tenchi's paused entrance, giving a vague, drained, and helpless clue before bending her head back to Sasami's.  
  
With slower steps and wider eyes, on thinner ice and colder air, Tenchi came closer. There was no strength, he told a million of his own voices, to remember dreams or trust instincts.  
  
"What's wrong, Sasami?"  
  
Not having heard his approach as Mihoshi had, Sasami swung her head upward. The redness swelling around her pink eyes held a monochrome that only intensified whatever tragedy was strangling the pillow and ignoring the blanket. From the way her tears spilled, as she gently yet no less quickly set Ryo-ohki aside, he feared he'd accidentally promised to fix everything before he knew anything.  
  
"Tenchi!"  
  
Sasami flung herself against him more desperately than she had after he'd reassured her place and Tsunami's as the same. She was slightly higher on his chest now, and cried with more force. After making sure he was supporting her correctly, Tenchi looked up to see if her other confidant knew any more than he did. Mihoshi rose and watched them through her own set of slow-sinking tears, hands welded together.  
  
"She's gone, Tenchi!" A second wail erupted before the detective could fully respond to his questioning look.  
  
"I remember hearing her come in last night, but when I woke up early to make her a special breakfast---she wasn't in the study, and wasn't on the beam---she wasn't anywhere!" The explanation was quickly followed by a wheezing sob that would surely rake out coughs or hiccups at any moment.  
  
Tenchi tried Mihoshi again, who had already given in to looking away, but could still sense her place.  
  
"We tried to get Ryo-ohki to help find her, but she isn't responding to anything we do."  
  
The weight turned to ether just so that it could more easily burn its way down to his stomach. And though he already knew the core it carried was a seed, he didn't feel its metal roots twist through him any less.  
  
Nobuyuki was beginning his morning lumber down the stairs. His only son knew he couldn't acknowledge him; his hand had already stopped stroking Sasami's hair.  
  
Tenchi looked down simply to escape Mihoshi's frailty and saw that his hand was still moving. Even though his father had yet to speak, he could hear him grow quiet and sit into the couch, slow and heavy. He hoped he could assume that the simpler man had already heard the outburst.  
  
"Why did she have to leave us, Tenchi?" Sasami groaned as she shook her head against him.  
  
"^I think she was afraid she'd hurt somebody^." Mihoshi drifted under a whisper.  
  
Tenchi looked over, seeing only the detective's profile, curtained with sleep-tangled hair. His appropriate response must have gotten lost along the way, again.  
  
"Sasami?"  
  
Aeka's quiet concern hardly matched the hurried steps that brought her into the living room. Her hair was still slightly slept-on and her morning robe billowed from her waist as she tied it mid-stride. Tenchi tried to gage the best course of action by her eyes and their baggage.  
  
She looked ready and even experienced to comfort away any nightmare, but hardly ready to face the more than possible news. Tenchi only kept eye contact long enough to know how much his numbed expression frightened her.  
  
"Tenchi, what's going on?" Aeka looked from the back of his eyes to the back of Sasami's head as it jerked out another choked sob.  
  
Something like a subconscious fear of the younger princess replying for him, and Tenchi held her closer.  
  
The broken toy half-movements of Aeka's mouth shifted through all possibilities till the same one tired of being ignored. She forced her mouth open a little wider, but couldn't do more than gulp at the spread of her own numbing wave. Tenchi feared for a moment that she was having just as much difficulty closing her eyes.  
  
A slow creak turned everyone's face toward the closet door with similarly strained movements. Even Sasami watched Washu's every step, joining the collective of drained and trembling eyes as they fought to foresee if the universe's personal genius would serve them.  
  
Washu kept her arms crossed and her head down, but clearly not for morning drowsiness; her steps were too light, even in her child form. Before she even regarded them with green glass shards and robotically tightened lines, Tenchi knew that Sasami had not been too hasty.  
  
Despite his confidence, Washu still surprised him by speaking evenly to everyone present while only looking at him.  
  
"She told me she thinks he's still somewhere she can find him."  
  
No time for a moment later, she continued walking on a path to the back door. The echo of her footsteps picked at him like memories made suddenly uncertain.  
  
Tenchi heard a few weak but quick inhales that didn't release. It meant something, but he only responded by dropping his head with tightly closed eyes, letting that pass as an indifferent bow. Detachment could, he realized, consume senses till the body or the other part left. Only Sasami's chaotic dash away from his chest was able to make him feel entirely present again.  
  
"Little Washu!" Sasami cried out, blocking the path of science with hands clasped and eyes wide in prayer. "Please, tell us you can find out where she went! She couldn't have gone that far!"  
  
"She told me I could either leave her with a fast ship I couldn't track, or deprive you of Ryo-ohki."  
  
Washu's reasonably prompt downward reply froze the lowest ground in Tenchi's self to crack it quickest, to swallow up the wave of numbness so that he could relive each needle of his initial shock. He only heard his own throat clench, and could only watch as Sasami's gapping mouth shook on its hinges. The last bastion of his quick reflexes rose up from the wreckage shortly after The Second Princess clenched her eyes to shame her barred teeth and tight little fists. Washu resiliently, then almost indifferently, absorbed a few hysteric pounds against her chest before Tenchi could hurdle the couch and hold Sasami back.  
  
"WHY! WHY! How could you let her leave us like that! You're not a genius! You're not! I hate you! I hate you!"  
  
Aeka and Mihoshi ran to aid Tenchi, though he didn't seem to need it. Washu just lowered her head and pulled one of her special jackets from a subspace wardrobe. Noboyuki stood by with helpless hands as Sasami screamed at vengeance denied. He couldn't be sure if anyone else heard Washu's wilted alternative to an apology amid the violence and the corpse of wind thrown at her exit.  
  
"If it's just the same to you all, I'd like to tell Yosho myself."  
  
***  
  
Overeager grasses died while more timid sprouts took their time, leaving the exposed areas as blank as they were often dark. Washu warmed up her mind by trying to construct a thermodynamic equation to explain why some seemingly random areas had melted while others were still freezing solid at night. It could, of course, be the result of all the repairs she had done in the area. From the look of things spring would melt it all before she'd be able to test any theories, anyway.  
  
At least the shrine had remained thawed. She sipped confidence from this till it dawned on her that no one had built a single snowman all winter. A thoughtful expression descended into dumb melancholy as she let her breath fall out on the surface of her tea.  
  
Her elegant-for-a-girl's fingers were pale, but still throbbed with a little too much heat. She set the mug down on the railing and wiggled them into her jacket pockets, wondering why Yosho always approached her from behind with slow, almost loud steps. Maybe he thought it made for a more romantic effect, a lesser chance of startling her. Or maybe she kept track of his every breath too closely.  
  
"It's a new blend." Yosho mentioned softly, setting his mug next to hers as he always had and rubbing her shoulders the way he'd quickly learned. Washu remained still, but lowered her head with closed eyes to be grateful.  
  
"It tastes like the one you usually make."  
  
The covertly undisguised prince beneath the priest laughed to himself in a tone that couldn't possibly offend anyone.  
  
"To be perfectly honest, it's a similar blend from a different vendor."  
  
Washu didn't respond to the little confession and kept her head steady despite the pressure of a new maneuver. Yosho glanced over her shoulder to catch a piece of her face, but could only see her cup slightly more full than his. A gentler chuckle cleared the way for him to ask for a confession in return.  
  
"How can you know if you haven't tasted it yet?"  
  
Tilting her head back a little and opening her eyes even less, she let out a breath to make a rough sketch of a wall.  
  
"Excuse me. I guess I meant that it ^smelled^ like the one you usually make." Sarcasm only dawned on her when she kept herself from adding something to the tune of 'Oh, wise one'.  
  
"I see." Yosho let his smooth fingers fall back, trying to catch the softness of Washu's hair without getting caught. If she noticed she didn't seem to care.  
  
A clump of snow rustled and puffed in a nearby tree, signaling another stretch of silence. Yosho frowned and pocketed his fingers before they realized how cold and obsolete they were outside.  
  
"How do you think she's doing?" A more forward attempt at deep warmth leaned him against the railing to gaze hopefully at her profile like a courting youth.  
  
"I do-not know," Washu said plainly and lifted her cup to blow on it, "so I try-not to think."  
  
Yosho looked at his own mug, equally unimpressed with his imitation of telepathy. It didn't take long for him to tire of it.  
  
"That doesn't really sound like you at all."  
  
"No?" Washu didn't leave room to regret her now almost hostile sarcasm.  
  
"No." Yosho's voice folded its arms resiliently, waited, and prepared for her reply even while he delivered his side approach.  
  
"Do you think any of them believed you wouldn't be able to keep track of one of your own ships?"  
  
"Probably not."  
  
Washu's voice smoothed out a space for more antagonism. Yosho waited for her follow up answer while he saw her brow narrow from the tensions in her neck.  
  
"I'm not a liar, by the way. I never ^said^ that I couldn't keep track, but without her consent there's no way for me to keep in touch. In any case, it seems she's found an outpost and 'traded up'."  
  
Yosho breathed in understanding and breathed out disappointment. His voice softened again with the hope of shaking her defenses, the fear of sentiment turning into stubborn curiosity.  
  
"I appreciated you taking the time to inform me yourself, but it's still a great disappointment that-"  
  
"That what? That I didn't warn you? That I didn't get your approval?"  
  
"No," Yosho pulled his shoulders back sternly, "that you agreed to pass along the message rather than insist she leave her own, at least in print."  
  
Washu's head tilted into a slighter voice.  
  
"At least Sasami, and you, both believe me."  
  
Yosho listened to her throat die with another sacrifice of the wind.  
  
The eldest Masaki could have remembered what it was like to regret a question and to wish an answer could have been avoided, but he tried not to. He didn't need to remind himself that no one needed to revisit a cause for doubt, even if indirectly.  
  
But any cause for quiet to be painful was unjust, and wishing for another wind made him feel a petty wizard rather than a holy man, an old man rather than a survivor, less a man for not making sure Washu's silence didn't submit to the current. He would roar back at white waters to bring her back if he had to.  
  
"Might someone else doubt you?"  
  
"Someone ^else^? Do you mean to say Sasami won't---and you can't?"  
  
Her harsh reply struck him blessedly quick and, if tricky, then he'd have to match her.  
  
"Washu, you must know you'll have to explain to them how you could let her search blindly for something that doesn't exist."  
  
"To them, but not to you? Is that it?" She tightened up all the work her companion had loosened. "Well what makes me so special to you then, or is it just your place to be trusting."  
  
"I-" Yosho swallowed weakly as Washu's eyes swung into him before the rest of her turned, heightening, maturing, gracefully ascending a spiral stairwell. Each and every time she'd changed this way it had taken only a distracted moment or simply a blink to hide it. Even as the curiosity finally outgrew itself, Yosho was ready to wonder how their eyes could have remained motionlessly locked the entire time. But, before that, he'd have to marvel that her emeralds could remain open so wide while the rest of her face clenched tighter, cocking to the side with some reemerging spite.  
  
"Or are you like the rest of them?"  
  
Washu took a step back to steady her threatened posture only to look like she'd taken a step forward.  
  
"Still worried about 'you-know-who'?!" The sarcasm clenched the tendons in her throat and cheeks so bitterly that she looked ready to spit out a tooth.  
  
"Ryoko thinks that I'm either a fool, or a liar."  
  
For Yosho, it felt surreal not to watch someone's body when their face threatened so much violence.  
  
"And if I'm a liar, it's because I either have him stored away in my lab, somewhere," sarcasm shook her vowels till she had to breathe, "or because I ^am^ him!"  
  
Her jaw clenched, yanking her eyes down under the shadow of her hair.  
  
"Well, wise man, which is it?"  
  
Yosho tried to breath and reach for her hand, resisting the truth that he would have to choose one or the other.  
  
"Washu, I don't think any of that is possible." His voice swam deep to travel under the buildup of so much floating debris.  
  
"Of course it's ^possible^, it's always possible that we're all playing along in a grand illusion. Hell, why only worry about this family being 'real'? Maybe we've just been livestock in a big metaphysical joke since before Seita even arrived, since we were born and bred and branded into-"  
  
The sarcasm shot Washu a single step forward to grab Yosho's collar. Having eaten itself, her sarcasm began to choke on the bones of its prey, but would not be denied.  
  
"There's some clever thinking Yosho, let's just officially assume that anything and everything can be an empty illusion!"  
  
Washu turned away again and clutched the railing, ready to vault herself over or tear it off as a weapon. Her voice lowered slightly, but didn't soften whatsoever.  
  
"I thought you'd have figured things out better after having such a 'personal' experience with him. Caution falls into helpless fear in a blink of an eye where he's concerned...even where he's just remembered."  
  
Yosho caught a glimpse of frailty as her reprimand trailed off, clear and pained. Some kind of boyish valiance chanced out his first response.  
  
"Is that what you learned from ^your^ experience?"  
  
He readied to absorb the most brutal of attacks, to endure eons of silence pushing the question everyone had waited for someone else to ask. It was possible they'd all assumed Seita never spoke between entering the lab and Washu's announcement. It was equally possible that he could be manipulating them for the rest of their lives, equally possible and self- destructive to consider.  
  
The wind hurt again, but Jurai's loss told himself to feel aware and alive as he took a step forward. He was ready to put a hand on the shoulder of Science's latest gift when it spoke. The pre-ancient voice surrendered with hardly a trace of honor, and it tightened everything in the victor's chest.  
  
"Yes."  
  
Not to let the wind make him feel any more alive than he was willing, Yosho fought his hand up and onto its proper place, where it could wait to feel her warmth directly and let the many strays of her hair tickle his knuckles. Whether it sounded wise or not, he wanted to let her know that he ^did^ still understand some things, one of them being the sound of too much to hold back.  
  
"I hope that this is the right time for you to trust me, and I'll pray that this was the right time to face him again."  
  
Washu seemed to move her head very slowly to look at his hand, to will it away or press her cheek to it. But she only froze her gaze on a different angle of the ground, unmoved by the victor's mercy.  
  
"He...he explained everything."  
  
"Everything?" Yosho winced to hear a small paper rustle in his confidence, and he tried to compensate. "What do you mean by 'everything'?"  
  
"I mean ^everything^." A lingering hint of that singular terror drowned out her frustration with him. He readied himself to think of how they would hold each other before he considered imagining what such a thing could leave as its final words.  
  
"Go on."  
  
She swallowed his support like a bitter cure-all, to humor him and her better memories.  
  
"For all I know he's already hinted at it to everyone, but that it was all just stored away with the rest of his-"  
  
As cold as it was becoming, it was still the warmest it had been since the first snow. Washu's word choice and shiver obviously came from some place deeper than skin.  
  
"-nature."  
  
Her first sip of tea took half her cup in a quiet gulp.  
  
"But I don't think anything he told me, lying there---so frail and defeated--- I don't think any of it was a lie, or at least he believed it wasn't.  
  
"It was like he'd been waiting for the single moment when he could let it out."  
  
The Found Prince could feel her wavering, losing herself in the memory. He wanted to shake her for focus, but instead came closer to put his remaining hand on her shoulder. He liked to think that this helped her raise her head to look out over the trees.  
  
"He wanted to be destroyed, Yosho."  
  
If her pause was for herself or for him, he wasn't concerned. If the softness was for bewilderment or if it was for pity, he didn't allow. Yosho gripped his ever-closer companion, ready to pull her into himself, but instead he struggled for balance as he refused to lower his head or breathe too harshly. The ambassadors from every faith and philosophy had come storming into his mind, yet upon reaching the podium they all tried to hide behind each other with both doors already closed behind them.  
  
Somehow Washu's new isolation brought them to attention.  
  
"This was the core of him long before he offered Tenchi a chance to do the honors, and before he prepared himself to give it to me."  
  
Yosho knew how to listen, and now, as Washu reeducated herself on how to speak, he thanked Life for every second of training he'd endured to learn how to listen without doing, thinking anything else.  
  
"The dimension we saw him access, the one nobody could stand to be near, it's not a dimension at all. The reason it was so very white, the ^reason^ it 'disoriented' us, is because it ^is^ ^nothing^. It is not simply a parallel existence as he let on; it is a precursor to everything--- to matter, to atomic energy, to time. It is the infinite blank slate that the universe grows over. And it still confounds me that, after he told us he could move his consciousness about the entire---universe, that no one asked if he'd seen anything 'outside'.  
  
She breathed once, twice, even.  
  
"Well, he had. He'd seen the universe expand over the emptiness like an ink stain."  
  
A humorless puff of air through her nose almost made it too easy for Yosho to stop listening.  
  
"And, apparently, 'stain' is precisely the appropriate term."  
  
If it was confidence she was rebuilding her support didn't notice, but would have hoped.  
  
"If a place more empty than could exist by the laws I know, if a place like that could be considered an entity all its own, and if its consciousness could ever want something, doesn't it only makes sense that it should want to be alone?  
  
"Seita came to understand that the will to exist, as manifested by a sentient being, must be some king of torturous cacophony to this 'oblivion'. It explained why he grew more powerful not for spreading destruction, but for spreading doubt. He believed that it ^knew^ the only way to erase existence was to infect all sentient beings with doubt, so that they'd eventually be so crippled with apathy that, whatever had started time and space and life, would finish it."  
  
The next stretch of silence cut into Yosho so deeply that he had to chance merely a slight lean, just to catch a bit more of her profile. Her emeralds had successfully frozen every possible tear into themselves. It was not glass, not stone, not even ice. He felt a coward for leaning back and praying for her to finish, and for the first time he felt that she was truly speaking to him alone.  
  
"But all that was not entirely what he wanted, perhaps it was only some bastard child of what he thought was justice and what he began to think was his destiny." Washu's breath strengthened necessarily.  
  
"He told me, that whenever he wasn't deliriously pursuing some higher kind of Godhood---he told me that he c---comforted himself, quelled his loathing with the idea that, since no ^truly^ omnipotent being had stepped forward when he was looking down on existence---he'd create the need for one that could destroy him."  
  
Washu finally lowered her head  
  
Yosho was breathing normally, but his eyes stared blindly for someone to lead him to a safe place. Every idea shuffled feet on its pedestal. Nothing would speak, even as he begged it to. As this new concept dried its wings, the others, for the first time, held a moment of silence for a birth. The return of calm to Washu's voice was slow in coming but short on introductions and the sound almost unbalanced her companion's feet.  
  
"I guess he just didn't want to wait anymore."  
  
After solemn minutes, with nothing of valiance this time, Yosho let his reflexes speak. There was hope that he could regain himself so long as he gave out only pieces at a time.  
  
"Is that all?"  
  
"He explained things with a bit more detail, and he couldn't seem to help toying with me, of course."  
  
Trusting his instincts again as he dreamed of trusting them, Yosho allowed himself the clearest notion of what might keep Seita from their thoughts.  
  
*Hold her, Yosho. Hold her close so that she will hold you.  
  
He hesitated, seeing The Ghost of Madness with hands outstretched. The same blue above the sea of fire consuming Jurai. If he trembled any more he might have to take his tender hands off her numbed shoulders.  
  
"You know, its funny," she began with a genuine shadow's sliver of life, "he gives me one of the most significant testimonies in the history of science, one that seems to prove that-" her laughs fall like the ghosts of coughs, "that I was 'right all along', that everything about existence can be put under a microscope. Stars, dimensions, Tsunami, life---it's all ultimately finite."  
  
Sarcasm approached closure like the weariest moth to the softest flame.  
  
"And when what he was telling me finally sunk in," the driest sobs could have been 'just tired' breaths for all Yosho's meticulous listening, "when I let myself entirely forget that he couldn't be trusted, and felt like I could tell again if someone was being sincere, one question absorbed all the others."  
  
Washu was staring straight ahead at the universe now but, Yosho noticed, even though it threw his visions of Seita into the background, that she was spreading one of her hands over his while turning to face him again.  
  
She allowed age near her eyes for the first time, however, the lines were anything but disqualifying. Much more intense, they stretched on her maiden's perfection till they made her look, and Yosho feel, even older than they were. It shamed him to be thinking such things as she was clearly looking for solace or nothing.  
  
"It's something I never thought I'd ask you, or anyone, for most of my life. But, just before---I almost asked him." She put her other hand over his, and he put his other over theirs. So much hope warmed in their palms that it hurt for-real to watch her head lower even just enough to be looking at his heart.  
  
"What have we done to deserve this, Yosho? What horrible sin did we commit to bring him to us?"  
  
They took turns tightening their grips as Washu shook too mildly to bother a sob. Every time Yosho had asked himself this question he'd been doing so reflexively, hypothetically. It sounded too vain to say he 'couldn't think of anything', but that was all he wanted to say.  
  
"Heh," Washu sniffed, scraping the barrel for spite, "I guess I already know your answer." She didn't try especially hard to mimic or mock his voice. "'Whether we deserved it or not is meaningless.for some reason or another we ^needed^ it.'"  
  
Her hands went limp in his.  
  
"So am I right?" She swallowed and pulled her hands out of his to clench them behind her back, her emeralds piercing back up at him with a surprise reserve of fire. "It's still the only question worth asking, by the way. Forget about whether I'm him---or this is ^all^ him. What's the answer.hmm? Chaos or fate? Firecrackers or puppets?"  
  
Yosho tightened his jaw to her callousness, hoping his tear would convince her of his sincerity if not of her own. He reached up to caress her cheek, they way he lived to do, they way he prayed would help them survive.  
  
"He managed to challenge both our faiths, but he couldn't give us any real answers."  
  
At the first sign of cooling behind her eyes he swiftly grew the gesture into an embrace, still unable to shake the fear that he had already failed. Washu matched his strength with little coaxing or effort.  
  
"You don't need to give up what you believe in," he kissed then whispered into her hair, "just to strike back at what you can't undo."  
  
Past a sigh, Washu breathed solemnly, her forehead warm against his neck.  
  
"I guess you are still a 'wise man'."  
  
Yosho embraced her tightly again for the chance to chuckle, yet all but let her go now that he had to prove honesty still overshadowed wisdom.  
  
"You're not the only one to have learned something."  
  
Impossibly, she felt softer beneath his hands. It was the temptation again, to lose himself in her rather than remember any more of him. If he could just take comfort in the idea that he didn't have a choice, that her revelation would draw his out no matter the pain.  
  
He would need her though. He would need her eyes even more than he'd wanted them back when he first told her about surrendering his illusion of age.  
  
"Washu."  
  
When he'd exhausted everything that might take responsibility for making him doubt so much.  
  
"Washu, look at me."  
  
When he hadn't been ready to tell her.  
  
"He told you, didn't he?" Washu almost interrupted.  
  
She had only needed to stare at him a moment before she could speak, swallowing his throat with the wholly ancient emotions of her own, of a compassion that, after eons, was still uncomfortable in its own skin.  
  
"About Jurai---he told you what they've made of you."  
  
Where there might have been accusation, or a challenge to his denial, she had formed a stare of nurturing, even apologetic encouragement.  
  
He breathed, but looked like he whimpered, to ask 'how', how she could have known, and then: how long had she known before Seita told him.  
  
A flash of crippling betrayal scratched at the base of him, but couldn't stand up to Washu's gaze. Instead of surrendering to the weight of searching out a replacement for his confession, he clutched about in himself for the strongest will. Finding it, he was inspired to finish what he'd begun.  
  
"Seita didn't explain anything of the universe to me," Yosho began, slightly stronger for being detached, still holding Washu's shoulders, "but now, what he did tell me, it might make more sense."  
  
Washu closed her eyes beautifully, ready, Yosho hoped, to give him all the strength he needed.  
  
"He'd prepared to send all of Jurai into chaos, but needed me to do it. So when I decided to stay on earth-" Though he'd started out strong, a familiar tightness caught up with his throat before it could cover much distance. He had to complete his confession with a series of brakes and broken strides.  
  
"By what he could observe, my decision made me into a sort of--- martyr---back on Jurai. So many now believe that Tsunami chose me of all Jurains to sacrifice myself for her, for everyone."  
  
He tried to smile for his next thought, but could only swallow and shake his head so slightly only Washu could have noticed, had she opened her eyes.  
  
"The new religion that rose up apparently made it too difficult for him to make a new plan to drive Jurai insane."  
  
Again he looked for poetic justice, and only found a cold universe.  
  
"If this is true---then I have to assume that my father has gone to extreme lengths to keep secret my place on earth---and my place in Jurai culture--- from me, my sisters."  
  
He gulped audibly for the bitter girth of truth.  
  
"It's good to know I don't have to doubt it anymore."  
  
Washu was almost timid when she moved closer, to stare up and into him again. She opened her mouth, but closed it with a breath, stepping back to let his hands fall off her shoulders, to let her own hands find professionalism beneath her arms.  
  
"One of the first things The Science Academy's biology department teaches," her voice stepped forward while her eyes retreated to a corner, "is to respect the fragility of an external ecosystem."  
  
Yosho closed his eyes and set his jaw tighter and tighter, till he couldn't keep her out of his arms. She responded in kind, letting him think clearly enough to offer thanks. He held her gently by the neck now, almost tempted to do nothing but watch her eyes nearly open as she held his hands in place.  
  
"You don't owe me any sort of apology, Washu. It is my father's duty to make these decisions, and if my mother can stand by them, so must I."  
  
A flash of disgust ruined Washu's face for half a moment, but she swallowed it in less time.  
  
"The strange thing is-"  
  
Washu opened her eyes at his resigned nostalgia to hold it up from self- pity. He looked steadily into the forest behind her to reassure them both.  
  
"It was not this knowledge that struck me hardest, and it is not what makes me uncertain if even my 'nephew' can breathe new life into the shrine. His intent was not to turn me against my father, or even to make me regret imprisoning Ryoko."  
  
He knew Washu could see his eyes faltering, but even if it spread, and he lost his mouth, he would continue.  
  
"Even though what he intended was to, as you said, 'destroy me with my own immortality', he...he was first determined to make me believe-" another swallow and Washu held his hands closer to her neck, willing to show her own fear of what he might remember.  
  
"He recreated my life here on earth, almost entirely, just to build up to the moment when he felt he could convince me that---that my life as a priest, that all my devotion to prayer and meditation, to cultivating my soul-"  
  
Tears streaked his face, but otherwise it remained unaffected.  
  
"For a moment then, and for half-moments every so often, I believe his voice when it declares that all of this," Washu blanched as he yanked a hand free to turn and gesture at the shrine, "is no less ^self-indulgent^ than any of his cruel ambitions."  
  
They stood up to silence together. Yosho let his head hang only a little while quieting breaths honored and returned his tears. Washu held fast to his other hand, looking out into the forest till thought fully refortified her face. They both wondered if the other had tired of tempting the paradoxes of guessing another's mind. If they knew this, they let it strengthen them no differently than fresh air, carried on a wind that seemed almost peaceful again.  
  
With flesh and blood fallen away, Washu imagined their skeletons glaring in the sun, sturdy as ever. She only hoped Yosho could feel the same, and when her voice reverberated in her throat it was as real as it needed to be.  
  
"He was a psychologist, by the way." Washu tried not to wait too long for the wind to carry this, what she hoped was the last revelation. When he looked back she tried not to wait for his expression to change, and wouldn't let herself reconsider where this information might take them.  
  
"The reason Kagato kidnapped him was, well," it hurt to fail at laughing just as much as she remembered, "he needed an on-hand therapist; he was there to counteract the effects of studying the opening."  
  
Yosho hardly breathed. Washu brought his hand back to him and let it hang gently alongside the other.  
  
"This is something for everyone to take as they will, but from what I've experienced it's a field that always gets caught, sometimes bitterly, between the two of us."  
  
Her next breath sincerely reminded her of a laugh, she tried another and almost fooled herself.  
  
"Maybe---maybe that saved us, that he couldn't totally undermine one without exalting the other."  
  
Yosho looked at her slowly, and found his smile slower, but he closed the distance between them in perfect time.  
  
"Maybe that's why-" Washu whispered to herself, but swallowed the rest as she swung her eyes up into his. "No, I don't think we have to defend ourselves anymore, and I don't have to say that even he admitted to not being certain about everything."  
  
Yosho's eyes reflected her affection, but his confidence managed to be smoother.  
  
"Perhaps you already said enough," he held her face, "when you said that he was gone."  
  
Their kiss was as real and then as long as it needed to be, but they copied it twice to be sure. Noticing the sunset, Yosho steered them toward it. He disciplined himself to see all of the aspects, even as he blinked. All the while Washu closed her eyes tightly, then tighter, then buried them against his chest.  
  
Fast winds sped the clouds over their colors, spreading promises of snow thinner.  
  
***  
  
Mihoshi knew what embarrassment felt like, but she'd never really had to explain it before. And if she could do it in a way someone as young as Sasami could understand, well then, did that make her a good teacher, or still just simple-minded?  
  
Washu had given everyone a batch of pills to help them sleep after the closing ceremony (no one called it a funeral), and another batch after Ryoko had gone, even though nobody had used up the first batch yet. Mihoshi, still being a detective after all, figured out that they weren't so much to help everyone fall asleep as to keep them from having bad dreams. Maybe the reason they didn't work on her was the same reason she could always find Washu wherever she was in her lab.  
  
Pills or not, Mihoshi felt as guilty as ever now. She'd lured Sasami into watching a late movie, hating herself, but hoping that her friend would fall asleep on the other couch, just so that someone could be there if another dream woke her. Serves her right; it turned out that the dreams bothered her a thousand times more with someone there to notice them. At least when she woke up with sweats, or white knuckles, or something strangling her all alone she could worry whether she'd woken anybody, and maybe even tell herself that something simpler had torn her out of sleep.  
  
"It's okay, Mihoshi. It's okay."  
  
Sasami had said it so many times already, but not once loud enough to be heard hadn't they been so close.  
  
The young princess had washed her hair recently. It didn't smell expensive enough to be grown up shampoo, but it was still the softest and sweetest thing Mihoshi could imagine, and that helped. When she felt the tips of tiny fingers on her own scalp she only hoped it wouldn't be too tangled.  
  
"I'm sorry."  
  
They were the first words she sobbed, but it felt like she'd already said them a hundred times more than necessary.  
  
"Wha-What for?" Sasami settled back to search up into Mihoshi's eyes.  
  
It was a simple enough question, but the pain of Sasami backing away was still distracting her.  
  
"I shouldn't have made you stay out here."  
  
It was surprising how simple the truth was when she forgot to think about it.  
  
Mihoshi waited for Sasami to call her silly, to say it was her own fault for trying to watch a late movie. Her petite, yet still unmanaged eyebrows moved together a bit, but as hard as she was thinking she couldn't have been angry. In a slow blink of gentle pink Mihoshi felt it was now her duty to comfort the younger friend.  
  
"I tried to get Aeka to stay out here to, or---or to find another cot so you could stay in the guest room with us."  
  
Sasami gulped something impossibly small that must have been conviction.  
  
"Nobody should have to stay by themselves---anymore---if-if they don't want to."  
  
It was the worst thing when Mihoshi could tell that two thoughts were tangled up and fighting but couldn't tell what either one was. This time hurt more than normal, maybe she was trying to blush, but her blush got the hiccups, but worse, like a really bad muscle cramp in her throat, then the back of her teeth. Regardless, every inch of her skin went cold as all of it brought back most of her dream. She'd have to apologize for hugging Sasami so tightly, but thank goodness she was crying too hard to be too loud.  
  
"^I was so scared!^"  
  
Somehow Sasami hugged her back just as hard. Luckily they were both on their knees so neither one had to worry about supporting all of the other. Mihoshi barely noticed this thought as it passed through vivid memories.  
  
"He---^He-^!"  
  
"Shsssh, it's okay."  
  
Sasami was crying too now, or about to. Mihoshi knew she'd have to apologize for that too, but didn't notice this thought much more as the memories decided 'vivid' wasn't enough.  
  
"I thought he was going to-"  
  
"Don't worry, Mihoshi."  
  
The sobs were starting to hurt.  
  
"Don't worry."  
  
"He-" Mihoshi began again, even though she knew she wouldn't be able to say anything.  
  
"It's okay, he can't hurt anyone anymore."  
  
There was no way such a small girl could calm herself down so fast. Mihoshi sobbed harder in frustration that she couldn't stop to peer into her little friend's eyes. When she was weakened enough to pull away she almost gasped at how much safer she felt, just looking. A big memory of the magical thing sharing a body with Sasami made the other big memory start to sink.  
  
"Sasami-"  
  
Now her beautiful little smile almost scared her as much as it hurt.  
  
"I'm sorry." Mihoshi still knew it wasn't making either of them feel better, but she must have stopped counting a while ago. Maybe, she hoped, she could try explaining it now.  
  
But then she'd have to remember all over again.  
  
But now it was too late.  
  
"He looked right at me---I mean right ^at^ me."  
  
Closing her eyes made it easier to talk to Sasami, but harder to remember and think long enough to speak.  
  
"It was like-"  
  
She was always terrible at describing things. Stupid. Stupid. Stupid. Maybe if she could skip ahead and just give an example.  
  
"I---thought one of Tenchi's father's comics.you know the one's we used to read together," Mihoshi opened her eyes and almost looked up, but closed them again.  
  
"I thought it might cheer me up, but it just made me remember everything.  
  
"And so then I thought one of the big books with tiny words and no pictures."  
  
She gulped only to worsen what was left of her throat. The whisper ate her sob so much that it sounded like a whine.  
  
"But that made me think of him even more!"  
  
Soon her arms and everything else started to feel weak, but Mihoshi knew she didn't want to sleep.  
  
"I don't know what might have happened, I don't know what I would have done. I know he's gone, he has to be, but I still can't stop these dreams."  
  
Sasami was quiet for so many long seconds that Mihoshi had to look up or have a heart attack. Again she felt so safe she couldn't---couldn't do anything, she guessed.  
  
"Tsunami and I both saw him," the young guardian began, a little louder than her charge's whisper, "and she was scared too, more scared than I thought she could be, and---and he looked at us too, he must have looked at me that way."  
  
Being angry always scared Mihoshi the most, but by now she was so scared in so many different directions that it came easy, especially since she couldn't think about it. Her voice sounded just terrible.  
  
"No, Sasami. This had to have been different, he was talking about-"  
  
Sasami's eyebrows had closed together again, still far away from anger, but a little closer this time.  
  
This time Mihoshi almost did fall over. She'd leaned back, her whole body retreating, just to think to herself that Sasami couldn't mean the same thing. But it was like all the apologies; it felt like she's said it so many times already and none of them had meant anything. The poor little girl almost fell back when Mihoshi threw her arms and the rest of her around the tiny shoulders as if it were her only chance to undo something.  
  
She felt horrible for whishing that they could both be crying, and it made her sobs hurt more. But then she got her wish and it made everything better, even if she couldn't understand any more gentle whispers.  
  
"But he didn't do it, he could have but he didn't---he didn't---he didn't want to. It was like, like when Kagato was controlling Ryoko, only no one was controlling him---but-but I still know he didn't really want to."  
  
Mihoshi didn't want to admit that she didn't want to understand anymore, even if she already did. After they gave up talking, then sobbing, then, after a long time, sniffling and smoothing the other's hair, Mihoshi wanted to pray that being exhausted would help her at least doze till morning. She almost thought it funny to know she would fall sound asleep before the prayer was finished.  
  
***  
  
The bokken blisters weren't quite as sore today when Tenchi dusted his palms off outside the tool shed. Better yet, he'd been able to leave his jacket unzipped all day as he worked to make the soil workable again. It would be good weather for growing things soon enough.  
  
Spring was still slow to emerge this year, holding onto thick clouds and pinches of snow long after the sleeping season had retired. Even his fresh- looking mentor, in the prime of his life, admitted that this condition made the air seem colder than it had been during any of the ice storms. Maybe this 'uncle' just wanted to make conversation or seem less intimidating.  
  
Thinking on this, Tenchi brought himself back to an unfortunately unforgettable practice lesson. He'd been blunt, even vulgar with the sacred Jurai techniques, treating his instructor's parrying sword like a witless punching bag. At first there was no face, or object for this rage, or rather, he would not let it appear. What concentration he could maintain overburdened itself with keeping this animosity on the situation, rather than the person behind it.  
  
But she ^was^ behind it, after all. And it would be twisting him any second now to be remembering how he envisioned her then, a sword-swinging symbol of her stubborn, selfish-  
  
Tenchi gripped his hands in themselves, feeling some water return to the blisters.  
  
The moment the weapon's recoil went numb he'd imagined it vividly, her wild mask replacing Yosho's true form. There was the sensation that his rage could prove itself just as dangerous as hers, that he still deserved a rematch for all the pain she'd caused. A good beating at his hands was exactly what she needed to snap her out of this damned withdrawal. And damn her recklessness.  
  
It only felt like 'damn' when it bellowed out of him to drive his bokken to crush through its opponent. Yosho had disarmed him mid swing and simply let his own momentum throw him to the ground at honorable teacher's feet. The cold stone pain gave him back his senses slowly, first to let him know that his outburst was still sending birds into frenzy.  
  
Breath by breath he'd pulled himself up, settling into a crouch that resembled a vagrant gargoyle but definitely not the humiliated bow the world deserved from him. He gave up preparing himself for the disciplinary strike, then gave up cowering from it like a dog, even though he wasn't, damn it.  
  
As he rose to face his instructor he couldn't find disgust, or even disappointment. Much worse: he truly thought he was being sized up for a lecture. When even that didn't come he was forced to search his grandfather's young eyes. This calm compassion was going to make him talk about his true feelings for the new development, as if they weren't already too obvious. He'd have to break back his fingernails to pull down the hurried wall built around everything Ryoko had done and still meant.  
  
He'd clenched into his blisters then, too, knowing he was far from ready to unleash any floodgates. In no time he would be cursing everyone for what was nobody's fault. Then he would finally lost the shred of dignity that kept him from yelling up to space incoherently till he chocked up exactly what made her departure so wrong.  
  
But all Uncle-Yosho had done was let out a breath that wasn't a sigh and walk back to the center of the courtyard, saying something simple like 'let's try again from a different stance'.  
  
There hadn't been another incident since. In fact he felt like he was finally working himself back to a place he might progress from again. Some injustices, his reflex wisdom told him, just had to be dealt with through control rather than tantrums.  
  
*Boy, I could use a hot bath.  
  
Tenchi breathed into his hands to ready himself for a short jog, but stopped on an awkward skip.  
  
Aeka was balancing her tea in her hands to the motion of their fully thawed porch swing. The best parts left of the sun smoothed over her and glared into him. He shielded his eyes reluctantly and approached, glad the light was again filtered and enhanced through the clouds by the time he reached her side. In turn Aeka closed her eyes to inhale the tea steam, a shy smile to be acting like she didn't know he was there. Tenchi sat down next to her without hesitating, even though he was terrified through every little movement. If he made the princess spill her tea he'd improvise Hare and Kare then and there.  
  
If fate, then it was merciful after all: Aeka merely bowed her head with a more heavily blushed smile and sipped her tea.  
  
"There's still some in the kitchen, some tea I mean, would you like me to bring it out."  
  
For a moment Aeka almost sounded like someone who'd been bullied for far too long. But Tenchi could only consider her as shy as ever and wonder how her milk skin could catch the sunset with a brighter gold tint than the purest patches of snow. And similarly, not that he wanted to avert his gaze, he noticed above the remerging grasses how insects trapped the last light in their wings like firefly imitations.  
  
"That's okay, miss Aeka." The dreamy tinge to his voice made his jacket seem quite unnecessary, but he gulped to think of taking it off next to her. Each blister felt tender against the next and looked raw under his scrutiny. He knew she couldn't be shifting herself closer to him, and knew one of her happy sighs when he heard one. It matched his memories perfectly.  
  
*Now, just don't tense up, don't tense up and don't look over at her for at least another minute. The sunset's getting even better, just look at that.and think of ^nature^ not romance, or anything.  
  
"I have a feeling that the 'spring' will be very beautiful this year, don't you Lord Tenchi?"  
  
Her careful use of the earth term touched his ears as delicately as what had to be his favorite and her most expensive perfume clutched the back of his eyes, and everything from his lower lip down.  
  
*Just breath through your mouth, Tenchi. There you go.  
  
It worked, but also made him sound like he was now prepared to say something important.  
  
"Uh yeah, I sure hope so."  
  
And he definitely wasn't.  
  
The bench-swing creaked under them both yet closer to Aeka; checking the corner of his eye, Tenchi made sure twice that she'd only set her tea cup down somewhere and crossed her hands into opposite sleeves. The jacket looked so inflated on her small frame that he had to hold back a chuckle from interrupting her new melancholy.  
  
"After all that has happened, it is very good to hear that you can still be optimistic."  
  
She must have intended to spread another layer over the past, but ended up peeling off the previous one. Tenchi narrowed his eyes over the field, all but seeing someone unwanted walking through the grass in yet another outfit suited only for display, but he closed his eyes before he could even finish their face.  
  
"How are lessons with the new shrine keeper if---you--don't- mindmeasking." Aeka asked more naturally, then less than the same.  
  
Tenchi memories jumped over the fresh actions of his uncle and fell to the side of what were nearly the last remains of his grandfather. There were dreams to go along; a thousand finely painted fingers spewing from cracks in the earth to drag them all through holes in space, five pairs of eyes stretching like cellophane as leering faces pressed through them.  
  
An expansive variety of voices and laughter snarled up in random samples to feed the grind of Tenchi's teeth. Yet, as was becoming the case with all his recent nightmares, the swelling rage in him popped like a balloon as his last vision of Seita's eyes flickered between his last look into Ryoko's. Even if he hated losing control of his anger more than ever, he wondered if he'd prefer that over the numbness that always followed sterile oceans being placed beside tarnished gold. He almost forgot that Aeka was sitting next to him as he let his head bow under pressure.  
  
"Forgive me, Lord Tenchi. It seems I've all but lost my sense of tact."  
  
Tenchi slapped himself out of it, perhaps too hard as he blinked rapidly to bring Aeka and her tender voice back into focus.  
  
"Huh? Aeka, what are you talking about?"  
  
"I'm only reopening old wounds." Her pitiful self reprimand put glass under his skin.  
  
Tenchi spread both hands into his hair and shook his head, as much for himself as for her.  
  
"No, no, ^no^ Aeka. You haven't said anything wrong, I'm fine, really."  
  
They were silent while Tenchi waited to give her apology back even more formally than she'd given it, and hopefully add his own. She remained as downcast and shy as a widow for long enough to turn him back to the sunset.  
  
"Hm." The thought in Aeka's head released a tiny, yet almost amused sound. Tenchi was quick to give his undivided attention this time.  
  
"What is it, Aeka?"  
  
"Oh, it's just almost funny that I keep giving you things that you don't want. Apologies, I mean."  
  
"Aeka, don't worry about it, okay? Can't we just enjoy the sunset?"  
  
The sudden croon in his voice surprised him. He'd meant to sound comforting, but had almost sounded seductive. Aeka looked up at him then, slow and gracious, both eyes, full force. Tenchi should have taken off his jacket, and should be following his own advice.  
  
Within a minute of retreating back into the scenery, the princess's near whisper found him again.  
  
"Lord Tenchi," fabric gasped as her hands move over themselves, "were you thinking about Seita?"  
  
A gnarled block of ice raked itself down his spine and dropped into his stomach from a high bridge. The ocean surged toward him, white with power, unimpressed by whatever justification he might have for dishonesty, unmoved that he still held up his hands to push back. Somehow he managed to keep his eyes on the sunset, even if they were closed for all the time before and after he answered, but answered evenly.  
  
"I was."  
  
The fabric of her coat moved beneath however long a breath she hoped would make a difference. Tenchi knew she was waiting for him to face her, or at least offer his profile. He hoped she wouldn't wait forever.  
  
"I remember, after," she swallowed, "after we began caring for Yosho, after we had already shared the basics of our encounters, you told us that you were always willing to listen if we needed to---share. But you, but we, we almost always ended up apologizing if we tried after that. At least, I know I did."  
  
Every last thing in her voice was pulling Tenchi's head away and down to the side, to better hear or hide his face. He could smell the perfume again but knew he couldn't breath above a whisper anymore. While he, now halfheartedly, searched for words to reassure them both, Aeka continued.  
  
"But now, after everything that has happened, I think it is more important that I be as honest as possible."  
  
Edges of Ryoko's voice echoed in the cave again, but Tenchi couldn't be interrupted. If Aeka was rushing herself, he'd have to calm things even faster.  
  
"I must apologize if this upsets things, but I can't bear the thought of keeping anything from you."  
  
"Aeka, what are you talking about?" He asked paternally, dismissively, and still halfheartedly.  
  
*Damn it, Tenchi, don't stop there! She might answer!  
  
In contrast to his reflexive confusion, her answer came almost naturally.  
  
"I was thinking about, Seita as well."  
  
*Yeah. And I knew it, and I couldn't say a thing.  
  
"Moments ago, right after I complimented your optimism, I began--- remembering."  
  
"Oh," Tenchi barely heard himself and tried to speak up before he gave out, "that's nothing to be ashamed of."  
  
"Thank you, Lord Tenchi. But it is not memories of ^him^ that shame me."  
  
"Shame you?" Confusion isolated him for a single blessed moment.  
  
"No," Aeka exhaled anxiously, then took a series of rapid breaths, preparing to dive particularly deep into frigid water. Tenchi slipped out of his jacket, moved closer, and attached his voice more sturdily, all without thinking.  
  
"Aeka, what's wrong?"  
  
"Lord Tenchi, there are some things that I've neglected to tell you that took place while Seita was still here."  
  
She sounded almost exactly as she had moments before Washu had sprung from her lab, full sized and bleeding. Preparing himself for the worst only seemed to bring out the worst in him lately, but he didn't believe there was a choice. Aeka held her breath this time and swung her eyes around straight into his.  
  
"That day, just before Washu tried to trap him in her lab, he---he found Ryoko and I asleep in the living room."  
  
*And he plagued you both with terrible nightmares about giving birth to monsters, I remember, and he did it because I was an idiot, an incompetent little boy. Anyone who trusts someone who can get into other people's heads doesn't deserve to walk on-  
  
Tenchi felt he could swallow his own tongue if he tried hard enough.  
  
"I remember, Aeka. You told me."  
  
With the boulder crumbling back to gravel in his throat, Tenchi mentally lashed back at that seemingly happy change to the household. For a moment all he could think of were stories of men dressing as clowns to abduct children. His hands began to shake as he consequently thought of Sasami on that roller coaster. It made it easier to fight this thought off when he reminded himself that this 'happy' period hardly lasted past his date with Ryoko.  
  
He suddenly found himself with more to lash at, but nothing could push back at the weight in Aeka's voice, as it was seemingly too much for her to even lift her eyes against.  
  
"There was more to it."  
  
She managed to look up at him and smiled with a strength that must have left the rest of her as frail as frost.  
  
*She's so beautiful.  
  
*I wonder if she cried for hours before she came out here.  
  
This time the warmth in his face was more pleasant and it flickered like real fire as he blinked rapidly. This time, he knew she was moving closer to him. He felt her hands wrap around his torso, promising to hold him rather than merely hug him. Unexpected but understood relief stumbled into him as he watched sadness reclaim the allure from her face and steer it back towards the ground.  
  
"But, Lord Tenchi, please---please let me tell you the next part like this." She inched closer and rested her head against his chest, moving her arms more snugly around him. "I know it's rude not to face someone when speaking to them, yet, if you'll allow, it would be so much easier for me."  
  
Tenchi knew she was referring to the position of their bodies more than the angles of their eyes. Rather than let too much in, he immersed as much of himself as possible in the irony that he wouldn't have had to sweat over how loudly his heartbeat struck her ear if he'd left his jacket on. Amid all this it surprised him to answer tenderly rather than diplomatically.  
  
"It's okay, Aeka."  
  
She sniffed, giving him a tiny and short-lived squeeze before returning to the trial of formality amid who knew what kind of confession.  
  
"You do remember then, when Ryoko and I told you---how he manipulated our dreams?"  
  
With eyes closed Tenchi considered everything akin to adjusting his throat, even though he knew the problem was in his guts and most of his bones. He managed to nod, then answered quietly after realizing she couldn't see the gesture.  
  
"Yes."  
  
"We---I told you that, in our dreams, he'd given us horrible visions of giving birth to---to-" Aeka probably wasn't gripping him as tightly as she wanted to, put Tenchi held her closer with no less sympathy. It felt, too, like she might be swallowing one sob after another.  
  
*Tsunami, mother, how am I going to do this?  
  
Tenchi closed his eyes and breathed concentration the way his grandfather and television showed him.  
  
"You don't have to do this, Aeka."  
  
She sniffled rough, but not as sickly as he might have expected.  
  
"No, Lord Tenchi. You have to know."  
  
Again she found so much strength that he eased up his hold on her for fear of breaking wherever she'd taken it from. Her voice wavered a bit more before she cut off any further argument he might have had, but Tenchi didn't notice.  
  
"In the dream---the baby was yours."  
  
This time she held him tight, and he could feel the softness of her cheek flatten itself against his lower chest.  
  
"Ours."  
  
Tenchi listened to the wind, for his heartbeat, for something to snap him out of whatever Numb and Petrified had spawned together. After moments indifferent even to the sunset, Aeka began softly crying her words out, and that revived him enough.  
  
"I'm so sorry I kept this from you."  
  
*How can her hair be this soft?  
  
"Don't---don't you see, Lord Tenchi?! He knew my most horrible fear was that, even though brother Yosho and my father started families from this planet, if I---if we-" Aeka sobbed more harsh, more helpless.  
  
Tenchi could have learned everything they'd left out when they'd taught him about inbreeding and birth defects in school, learned it all at once even, and it still wouldn't strike him this hard.  
  
"And I'm ^still^ so terrified that, if you and I were to wed, something might go wrong with our---there might be chance that our children would be born and-"  
  
But it would probably feel little different when so much knowledge drained from his head the same way it, apparently, still did. Aeka continued shaking her head and muttering faintly through the muted sobs, likely apologizing, when he managed to convince himself what it all meant, like unquestionable clockwork. The twinge of taboo still simply wasn't there.  
  
*Tell her it's okay. Make her feel safe. Lean in closer and whisper not to cry, not to worry. It'll be okay.  
  
It was soon thoroughly unnerving, not that he was somehow calm while comforting a beautiful girl, all but helping her to his handkerchief, what took him aback was where he realized Seita had gone. By some miracle Tenchi caught a glimpse of trapping him in perspective, of being able to look at and recognize his hatred in its place as a lower priority. He could hardly believe how well he was focused, how clearly the important things put themselves ahead of whatever that maniac had been for. An almost intoxicating warmth, that he hoped resembled what he was giving Aeka, began to rush into him, however, it made him notice that she'd pulled away to properly blow her nose on her own stash of tissue.  
  
"Thank you, Lord Tenchi. You are so---so-"  
  
"It's okay Aeka, don't worry about it."  
  
He cut off her almost exhausted thanks with another diplomat turned seducer. It froze his blood for a moment to think he might be sounding like Seita, but Aeka quickly melted it, and even evaporated a little for good measure, returning to her position against his chest with an even more velveteen tone.  
  
"It's always harder to worry when I'm with you."  
  
The almost childish response was too sincere to judge. Tenchi felt the fire in his cheeks churn to white embers, no longer convinced that anyone could be that close to his heart and not know its force. When he turned back toward the sunset to consider this line of reasoning he felt Aeka shift, but before she could lift her gaze as well an entirely new thought stole its chance to push to the front.  
  
*Tell her. Now.  
  
"Aeka, listen. I have something I want to share, too.  
  
*You have to tell someone, and who else can you really confide in anymore?  
  
"Yes Lord Tenchi, what is it?"  
  
He wished that he hadn't sounded so deathly serious, and he wished he could better tell the difference between nervous and anxious. In any case, it was too late to withdraw now. Aeka had finally cut in everything he'd thought was painted on obviously enough. If she wants to tell him so directly that she thinks about their children, then he'll eventually have to tell her what Seita had shown him that night. But in remembering what was far to the side of those 'revelations', there was something that preceded, and fit even closer to the shame she'd felt. If it had been a test before a bargain, it would haunt him. If he kept it to himself till he had absolutely no ideas left of what it had been, it would scar him.  
  
"Before Seita-"  
  
*I can't do this. I know I'm not even remembering all of it, but it still makes me want to scream. How could I have been so weak?  
  
*No! Snap out of it!  
  
*Aeka, she's here with you, holding you now. You can be strong for her.  
  
"It happened before---before he cut himself off from his power."  
  
Tenchi breathed once and tightened his grip gently, relieved to almost another breath when she returned twice the pressure.  
  
"That night he opened one of his portals in my room. But it was so small-"  
  
Aeka's face moved, and he noticed, but couldn't move till he handed over everything to his throat again.  
  
"It was so small that I could hardly notice it at first. And for some reason I could actually be near it without the usual effect. I could even stand and walk towards it."  
  
*Stop shaking, damn you.  
  
*But no! Don't stop talking! Tremble all you want, but don't stop talking.  
  
"When I took the first steps," he could at least teach his breath to be anxious instead of nervous, "I thought I might actually be able to, to overcome it, I guess. Then before I knew it I was reaching out, trying to hold it in my hand like some grand prize."  
  
It was only two long breaths before Aeka must have realized that he wouldn't be able to continue without her.  
  
"I-I'm," it sounded too sweet to be a stutter, "I'm right here Tenchi, you can tell me. It's alright."  
  
His eyes closed to her voice without his permission, but thankfully his mouth opened.  
  
"I think I might have known, for a second anyway, how Seita felt when he first started to live inside that place; I was ^drawn^ to it. I wanted to get closer and closer, first to---show I wasn't afraid, I guess, but then I wanted it, wanted to have it, and I couldn't stop. I can't believe I could be so-"  
  
Shoulders, head, all of Tenchi was curling inward. He wanted to say that he barely snapped out of it, though wanted more for Aeka to figure that part out herself. Whatever she had put together she held him up with it, her hand only needing to touch his cheek, or the air immediately before it.  
  
"That's all over now, Lord Tenchi. Whatever he did to you, it's over."  
  
"Aeka."  
  
"Yes?" She hid her surprise as quickly as he wore out his fear.  
  
"Please, from now on, seriously, please, please don't call me 'Lord' anything."  
  
When enough moments overstretched themselves for Tenchi to be sure, certain she wouldn't be so agreeable this time, she smoothed over even more of everything that would have kept him trembling.  
  
"I'll try, starting today, I'll really try."  
  
There wasn't much of the sun left, now that Tenchi had enough nerves to look at it again.  
  
*Why do I feel so tired?  
  
He wouldn't yawn or stretch, but he would breathe again.  
  
"It's going to start getting colder again, do you-"  
  
"Can't we just stay out here a little longer?"  
  
Tenchi hadn't really breathed as forcefully as he could have, and hadn't asked if it would be okay if he started smoothing her hair again.  
  
"Tenchi."  
  
By all means he should have yanked his hand back behind his neck, but it simply glided down to her shoulder as she inched closer and brought her head up beneath his chin.  
  
"You still miss Ryoko, don't you?"  
  
Tenchi figured his ribs had to made out of rubber to be keeping whatever it was in or outside them. The rest of him might as well have been in the onsen or in space, but he tried to thank something that his head was finally too chaotic to be pained. Everything in the jumble seemed like a reflex, or an old memory anyway. And besides, he was too tired to give a real answer, so he shouldn't worry.  
  
"By her time I guess she hasn't really been gone that long."  
  
*^That^ was not the answer I wanted.  
  
"No, I suppose not."  
  
*And ^she's^ not supposed to have such a wounded answer.  
  
It was just like every tender moment around here, Tenchi thought, ruined by the pain the two girls caused each other.  
  
*That's it, she can come back when she's done being so obsessed. I'm sick of all this-  
  
Tenchi saw his hand clench over Aeka's back and thanked everything that he wasn't holding her anymore. She could probably still hear his heart, and now maybe his teeth too.  
  
*Well there it is, that horrible pain, this damn cannonball, and all for what? Some poor experiment that desperately needs attention?  
  
Tenchi waited to see if Aeka noticed the metal that yanked his jaw down to crush the rest. He pulled up the pieces slowly, amazed she hadn't noticed, though she'd obviously been thinking too.  
  
"She may not return for some time."  
  
*Oh no, am I going to-  
  
Eyes closed, breathing, Tenchi noticed Aeka again, every last inch and scent. If the weight inside him was hell then surely being able to sense her was something else.  
  
*That's it, whatever this grief is, if Ryoko's going to give it to me I'm going to throw it right back.  
  
"I guess there was nothing we could have done about it."  
  
The weight seemed to melt then, filling every part of him with iron as a cold liquid. Tenchi could believe that this was like dissipating; it was falling apart inside him but soon it would crumble away.  
  
A long breath of air filled Aeka's lungs, and she brought her face level to his. The tear lines on her face were barely there, and only made her look more determined. Tenchi saw Ryoko and Seita, and himself with his scalp in his fists.  
  
He remembered two ships crashing each other into a bay, and watching something supernatural wither away.  
  
The sound of Sasami's laughter and gods Aeka was so beautiful and how could he have attacked so blindly.  
  
There must be a way for Washu to contact anybody and Yosho must have seen something more and he had to breathe soon.  
  
"I do so hope you don't blame yourself."  
  
More than halfway through with the compassion, she turned away and rested her back against the swinging bench, rocking them a little. When Tenchi could look she had already bowed her head, but low as it was he still expected to be able to notice when the coming tears broke through.  
  
*I have to put my arm back around her. Now, do it now.  
  
A sacred spirit out of hiding, Aeka's voice put his arm the rest of the way around her, a perfectly gentle new mother who would not think twice to defend her family to the death.  
  
"You know how unpredictable she is."  
  
Even though he saw everything again, the weight seemed to fill even his eyes, making them oddly impossible to blink. In any case he didn't feel like he knew much of anything beyond Aeka's face lifting into view again. All the sinister blues crumbling and selfish golds weathering, but The First Princess of Jurai was lifting her head again, eyes first at least.  
  
"Tenchi, you know that, no matter what happens, no matter what my father says, I'll stay here as long as you want me to."  
  
She was moving her eyes back to his very slowly, but his thoughts rushed about faster than ever. His voice was so reflexive and hushed that he didn't mind that it spoke for itself.  
  
"Thanks, Aeka."  
  
The weight had to be nothing compared to whatever her eyes were doing to him. He told himself that it was his cowardice, rather than any type of honor that was wailing out at him to put up some kind of guard.  
  
One specific memory began to gain footing and Tenchi didn't have room to care how gulping would seem now. He'd seen this consuming affection before, but clearly she'd held it back for too long. In fact something might split across her taut and slightly reddened perfection if she didn't swallow loudly too.  
  
Even before she balanced herself with a hand on his leg, Aeka began leaning towards him. This first movement could have separated a moth's wing, but it shattered glass and pined Tenchi down with it. Passion became her, someone who would truly adore and never doubt him, who would stay by his side perhaps even after death. Her voice promised even more even if there wasn't such a thing.  
  
"I would never leave you, Tenchi."  
  
Aeka closed her eyes sooner than most would have, but with nervousness that ^must^ have been merely hidden better than his, she pressed her lips together then gently parted them to fit a few threads, to reach out. He forced his eyes closed, knowing he was too heated to be nervous and hearing someone yell about this or that not being done properly. The voice was right as right but it didn't mean anything. None of the horrible things in his head meant anything and he didn't care if one more fact was one of them; Aeka was perfect, and all he wanted, and now, now and forever she would protect him from every pain.  
  
Their kiss folded together with such care that their noses hardly bent. They pulled away after only a minute but only for long enough for a single breath. Friction let out its special definitions, the clouds and rivers trading qualities; tiny wet sounds for hidden shimmers grew steadily louder as Aeka trembled opened her mouth to invite every part of him inside her, to gloriously claim her prince.  
  
Tenchi was acutely aware of his growing arousal, the amazing warmth just behind a person's teeth. If he still felt the weight, or even now more than everything, it was really pure bliss for not even fear could be this intense. As unnecessary, as absurd as it was, he even reassured himself that it simply couldn't be guilt, not after everything they'd endured. They deserved perfect fate.  
  
He felt like he was eating the world and cursing random people in a chaotic new tongue, but the next time he stopped to breathe it didn't even feel like stopping. He would not stop and would prove he didn't have to as he intensified the kiss to the point of eliciting throaty moans from his princess. After, whenever he decided that they should go inside, everything would be different all over again, but everything would have no choice but to be better. Aeka's hair was even softer the deeper his hand moved, and now the bare voices cut out of her breaths dragged his mind further under white steam waters. 


	3. Verse Thirteen is Sympathy

Standard Disclaimer:  
  
I thank all the owners of the Tenchi characters who have chosen not to sue me for suggesting some alternative uses for them.  
  
Standard Advertisement:  
  
I thank all the readers who have perused my other submissions and favorite authors.  
  
Standard Procedure:  
  
Check malfunctioning machinery for the simplest solution first.  
  
Tenchi Muyo: Sanctuary and Asylum  
  
-Verse Thirteen is Sympathy-  
  
Watch as shy yet staying questions---come to grudges, start to share.  
  
Delicate hands hide an honest face---and fistfuls of discolored hair.  
  
Bowed, bent out, and back again---to search in circles unaware.  
  
What does it take to give it up---as if the will were never there?  
  
-ZJS  
  
Just as the elderly and the meteorologists who listened to them predicted, winter had been intense and short-lived. Ice water and dirty slush lingered in allies or crept up doorways to cause minor water-damage in those older places. Tenchi thought of describing it to his fellow students as a "sore loser season" but he worried it would make him sound like someone older than he was, and not in a good way. Nonetheless, he stored it away in case he had to make conversation with one of social science teachers. Almost without fail, the softer subject professors were ever anxious to engage their students in academic diatribe. Something to fill the time between regurgitating loose and looser facts, Tenchi supposed.  
  
Even grandfather had been surprised when Noboyuki suggested his son take some of the "less important" classes this semester. How could an overworked architect have a bout of almost motherly advice? What would be a mystery to most was all too obvious to Tenchi; he tried to imagine some unforeseen positives of absentee guilt, but decided not to think about it at all. There were enough pressures on his mind apart from his dad's attempts to act as his wife's medium. The very idea had taken about an hour to burry.  
  
"Sore loser."  
  
Tenchi mumbled under his cloudy breath as a bitter wind pulled his arms together. Early spring mornings were still cold enough to make him wear a sweater, re-named for the sweat it would be absorbing when he got to chipping away at the semi-frozen soil. He looked over at the sunrise; through with admiring its beauty, he frowned for it to be warmer this time. The crisp green rebirth around him was still dulled gray by sparse light and paled by patches of frost. With luck the tools he'd strategically- accidentally left at the fields would not rust.  
  
Changing direction, he kept his eyes on the ground to avoid the low sun's glare. Another nibbling wind made him wish he'd stayed for the cup of hot chocolate Aeka had offered him. He tried to imagine the taste of it, but some memories of Aeka's other offerings snuck by instead.  
  
Tenchi remembered the look of retrained euphoria on Aeka's face when they'd finally decided to part and go in for dinner. It had almost scared him into forgetting the intense hunger still imbedded in his lips. He'd begun to sweat for visions of the princess formally announcing how the house and shrine would be remodeled to accommodate their wedding.  
  
But these were only drops. Soon he'd pictured everything, from a giggled up and over celebration of their finally-realized love, to a surprise elopement aboard Ryo-oh, where she would...dress him in that Jurain outfit he'd liked so much.  
  
Helping to prepare dinner had been difficult, his attention teetering on the edge of Aeka's own reactions. But all she did was blush feverishly and maintain an awkward silence till Sasami came in to do the real work. Everyone had eaten like a family who was reasonably content, the approach of Tenchi's new semester making a ready and diverting scapegoat for every possible tension.  
  
Both of them had remained motionless and silent on opposite couches till the rest of the house slept. He'd gradually turned the volume down on the television before turning it off, wondering if his hand looked presentable as Aeka watched it lay the remote down.  
  
The rest of that night replayed slowed Tenchi to the pace of a man who had far more to remember.  
  
---  
  
"Lord Tenchi," Aeka began softly as ever.  
  
"Yes," it took a moment for Tenchi to blink out an answer.  
  
"I don't want to foolishly assume anything about what we have shared today, I can only tell you what it meant to me."  
  
The way she refused to take her eyes off him made it hard to place the passivity in her voice.  
  
"Okay."  
  
But Tenchi certainly didn't feel in any position to take control.  
  
"I love you, Tenchi. I cannot tell you how much it means to me---to be able to say this now. Our kiss has made this day the happiest I can remember, but also the most frightening. I tried to hide my nervousness--- in hopes that you might give some sign of our next step...if, if there is to be one."  
  
Tenchi melted at the worry in her voice, almost falling over himself to reassure what he could.  
  
"Aeka, I'm just as confused as you are. It all just happened like-."  
  
She looked ready to burst into tears as he rushed to sit next to her.  
  
"Don't worry Aeka, I'm---I'm happy too. It was beautiful. It was all beautiful. And I guess I'm sort of glad---that you're as confused as I am, I mean."  
  
His weak chuckle elicited a similar smile, and he was ready to commend her for remembering to drop the title from his name, but her face quickly pulled itself into a serious line.  
  
"I am ^not^ uncertain, Lord Tenchi. I want to be with you, I want to offer you my hand and my heart for the rest of our lives. I---I want this to be only the first of many nights where I can be so close to you." She gently spread her hand over his and looked up to plead mere invitations dry.  
  
The weight settled again and he scratched the back of his neck, slow then slower when he realized it didn't help any more. It had subsided or exhausted itself during dinner, but there it was again, a pain that blunt fear wished it could achieve. He would either be pulled completely into Aeka's passions or into his own doubts again if he didn't secure some time to think.  
  
"Don't worry Aeka, tonight meant something to me too. But let's just keep this to ourselves till I've figured some things out. In the meantime we can just---move slowly."  
  
His warmest if not entirely focused smile would have to do.  
  
Aeka lowered her head and perhaps intentionally obscured her reaction. She soon looked back at him, however, showing agreement or at least adoring restraint.  
  
"As you wish, Lord Tenchi. Sleep well."  
  
Aeka kissed him then, only a soft moment, perfectly calculated to make him think only of every step she took to her room.  
  
---  
  
The memory had since deflated and accelerated like a balloon, blowing through the sleepless nights and tightened days that followed. He could not dismiss the threat of potential betrothal and betrayal, disapproval and disownment. His fear of Emperor Azusa continued to haunt him almost as much as his bitter, almost spiteful final memories of Ryoko. It came as small comfort that he was able to say he wasn't worrying about Seita without inviting his memory back.  
  
A malady of despaired faces and overburdened responsibility continued as the only other option to the almost narcotic rush promised him. Every time he'd been able to manage something like an outing, or catch something like a private moment with the princess, they'd kissed. Perhaps he was still unnerved by the sheer passion he could feel her restraining, but more than likely it was his own burdened mind that kept severing each connection before it even grasped the beauty of the first. Tenchi felt his throat swell with all the imaginary words absent from their most recent goodnight. He the real thoughts instead, again.  
  
* It's just like I feared more than anything; now that I have an easy opportunity, barely even a decision anymore, I can't even reach for it without yanking my hand back like a scared little boy. Now she's going to think there's something wrong with her.  
  
Tenchi's face tightened, brow settling in to give himself another merciless blow.  
  
*And all I can say is "I don't know". Now what in the world made me think that would help anything? If I'm going to torture us both with this I might as well just lie to her!  
  
His feet stopped numbly enough for a lost or forgotten path. He even seemed ready to scan about to re-orientate himself, but only hung his head lower to make sure his next steps were slow-paced and firmly placed.  
  
*No Tenchi, you know you couldn't do that. Just because you can't say what it is doesn't mean there's nothing there. There's got to be a reason I'm so-  
  
"Good morning, Tenchi."  
  
The unfamiliar voice politely introduced a man younger and more dignified than he could ever imagine his father being. Not wanting to be taken off guard by whoever it was, he took a quick and modest defensive step back before even looking up.  
  
"Master Katshuhito told me about your tendency to let your guard down, and he suggested that I keep you working on it."  
  
Arms crossed too condescendingly for someone his age and voice too friendly for a new teacher, the young man smiled at the confusion on Tenchi's face. They managed to level off though, as the student slowly pulled in some predictably shocked realization.  
  
"Grandpa?"  
  
"Yes, my uncle. He called me here to take over his duties at the shrine-" the new relative tilted his small glasses to catch the sun in a hauntingly familiar way "and his duties as your instructor. It seems you're lucky I was not an attacker."  
  
Tenchi tightened his inspection of the new old man on the mountain, tilting his head almost rudely. A strong urge to chuckle at the situation began to push aside previous musings and a sneaky idea whispered sharply. He straightened and bowed, just enough to sneak under the glare of new glasses to the same wise eyes he'd known all his life. Behind his concealed smile he hoped his good humor might show through.  
  
"Master Yosho, please forgive my inattentiveness, I must have forgotten the exact time of your arrival."  
  
Master Yosho did a masterful job of concealing the embarrassing knowledge that Master Katshuhito had forgotten to name said time. It was enough to soften the sternness on his mouth.  
  
"No harm done, Tenchi. Your grandfather already wrote me many letters explaining the shrine, you, and your home in great detail."  
  
"Did he?" Tenchi asked with slightly exaggerated formality. As he rose from the bow he noticed his obscured kin raising an eyebrow to join the expansion of their semi-private joke.  
  
"Indeed he did, I look forward to truly testing your skills."  
  
"As do I, it will be a privilege to train with such a ^young^ instructor. Not to dishonor my dear grandfather, but I think his age was beginning to slow him down. He made the right decision in retiring."  
  
"Oh?" A suppressed chuckle almost spade the charade.  
  
Tenchi smiled widely.  
  
"Tradition is important of course, but I'm eager to learn from someone who at least has a concept of modern principles."  
  
"Now I don't remember my uncle as being ^that^ much of an old coot."  
  
A wonderful pain began to take hold of Tenchi's cheeks, the first bit of lightheartedness he'd taken for himself in how long. But just as he was about to give away the joke, he gave away its humor. Thinking about the sudden absence of unpleasant thoughts would still invite them back. In a desperate attempt to keep at least some part outside the pit, he grew sincere and solemnly nostalgic.  
  
"No, he's no old coot, I'm sure he's just as wise where he is now as he was when I first began training with him. There aren't many Shinto priests around these days, and there are probably even fewer as good as him." The extra bit of straw loaded onto Tenchi's emotions gave him a small choke. "Of course, there will only ever be one 'Grandpa'."  
  
Yosho began to smile a proud old man's smile. At the sight of this, the younger kin stood straight and calm without need for exaggeration.  
  
"But I wish Master Katshuhito the best, if anyone deserves a real vacation it's him."  
  
It comforted Tenchi now, to be looking his grandfather in the eye again, unconcerned with the changes. But he must have still looked in need of some comforting. Yosho stepped forward and put a hand on his shoulder with the sincere ease of someone who'd done so countless times.  
  
"I'm sure the greatest honor you can do him is to honor what he has taught you."  
  
Tenchi blinked slowly and looked up with slightly reluctant acceptance.  
  
"Don't worry Tenchi, I'm sure you'll visit your grandfather many times yet, and he's likely not through with you completely, not by a long shot." Yosho pulled Tenchi's smile out with his own. "But don't forget, little cousin, I'm your family too."  
  
The gentle squeeze left on his shoulder spread through Tenchi's chest like a sip of warm tea, though he still blew into his hands before excusing himself.  
  
"Thank you, master Yosho. If you need anything at all I'll be getting the fields ready for planting." Tenchi bowed and began to turn away, still smiling over his shoulder. "Its cold now, but I'm sure it will warm up soon."  
  
"I certainly hope so," Yosho grinned and rubbed his arms in kind.  
  
After only a few steps, Tenchi froze at the even more imposing voice his grandfather must have frightened servants with back on Jurai.  
  
"Tenchi!"  
  
Surely he must have done something wrong, but he tried not to cower as he turned.  
  
"Y-Yes, Master Yosho?"  
  
"Tenchi, I---I was informed that there was a woman staying with you who was- --who was handy with machines."  
  
Tenchi could hardly believe the nervousness that had snuck out of Yosho's mouth. Surprise quickly remembered amusement, however, when the former prince of Jurai conjured such a blush it could be seen even with the faint morning light behind him.  
  
"Why, she's almost always in one place."  
  
"And where is this?" Yosho mirrored Tenchi's renewed playfulness but couldn't blur his own hesitation.  
  
"In her lab beneath the stairs, of course."  
  
"Oh, I see."  
  
Yosho chuckled and actually began to scratch the back of his neck, turning comical into surreal for someone who'd just lost the mannerism themselves. Tenchi remained wide-eyed as he listened to his new instructor swallow his fear, practically command that the field be tended without any more delay, and walk toward the house in no particular hurry. It took some moments before either of them could chuckle at the situation, and a few more to remember the difficult thoughts they'd interrupted.  
  
***  
  
The wooden salad bowl beat a deep drum against the linoleum, echoing the soft splash of freshly torn lettuce. A few pieces fell onto Sasami's feet as the bowl rolled and turned and gyrated out. Yosho looked at the mess he was in; his youngest half-sister would have to be caught soon, or parried.  
  
"^Brother^?" Sasami tried to reflect the ghost she was looking at.  
  
The picture perfect memory considered making a joke, but 'is this how we greet new guests around here' was the best he could think of, and it didn't seem enough. Instead he simply softened and nodded his head with a yielding smile.  
  
"Yes, Sasami. This is how I will look for a while now, remember, somebody had to replace the aging priest."  
  
Looking up to see her expression unchanged gave his smile a moment's worry. All he could offer now was himself. The new shrine keeper extended his arms with the loving smile he always saved for his sisters and hoped he hadn't forgotten.  
  
"But you're welcome to call me 'Brother Yosho', if you like."  
  
A giggle shook a few tears loose from Sasami's face, but she held it in during her dash across the lettuce and over the bowl till she could release it properly. After a few sniffs, and a few more wipes against Yosho's chest, they were all laughs.  
  
"It's so nice to see you like this again!"  
  
"I really do not feel especially different."  
  
"Yeah, well, I still like it better."  
  
Yosho chuckled along with her for a few moments as Sasami swayed their embrace from side to side. He placed a hand over what had been pigtails for so long, watching the French-braid ponytail dangle.  
  
"You're certainly growing, Sasami."  
  
She pushed away and sighed nonchalantly at his compliment.  
  
"Yeah, yeah. Everyone keeps telling me that, especially Aeka."  
  
"I'm sure you'll be just as lovely as her before you know it."  
  
Sasami was silent, keeping her eyes down. Her face blanked slightly off to the side, and she rubbed her arms uneasily. Yosho expected a spirited protest asking if she wasn't already, then worried for a moment that she might mean it. Before he could deepen his concern she bit her lip and smiled up some mischief.  
  
"I bet ^Little^-Washu will like the new look."  
  
Yosho watched his little sister's eyes sparkle a bit more for every layer of red added to his cheeks. He tried to laugh it off.  
  
"Ah-ha---yes. That reminds me; she wouldn't be in her lab right now, would she?"  
  
His chuckle sputtered out into thin air, and he realized with a strange shock that he'd been scratching the back of his neck again. When he looked down he noticed a similarly perplexed expression on Sasami's face.  
  
"Of course, where else would she be?"  
  
He sighed, trying not to hang his head too low or drag his feet too long as he walked past Sasami toward the closet. She managed to dodge a bit when he moved to ruffle her hair.  
  
"Thanks, Sasami."  
  
By the time Yosho thought to move with more dignity he was already reaching for the doorknob. He heard the unmistakable static of someone suppressing a laugh and turned toward Sasami.  
  
"Hey, Brother Yosho?"  
  
"Yes, Sasami?"  
  
She tried to hold back the intense blush with both hands, her braid swaying.  
  
"Are you guys gonna play doctor now?"  
  
Yosho heard a microscopic gasp escape his throat and felt all the excess blood in his face leave, taking the normally present amount with it. He stared at her with wide eyes, trying to focus his thoughts enough to tell himself that she hadn't said what he thought she'd said. Better to make doubly sure.  
  
"Wha-What did you say Sasami?"  
  
"Oh dear, now what am I going to do about the salad." She answered in a soap commercial voice, turning to fix the dainty crisis.  
  
He blinked a few more times, and considered asking again when some of the blood returned to his face. Sasami was clicking her tongue at herself as she turned over the bowl and began tossing bits of lettuce into it. Hardly bothering to hold his head up anymore, not bothering to knock, he began to open the closet door.  
  
"Brother Yosho, while you're down there tell Washu that lunch may be late." Sasami called out plainly.  
  
Yosho nodded to the darkness. The door closed behind him very quietly.  
  
Just when she'd decided on a tune to hum, Sasami had to stop and turn her head back at some very hurried footsteps descending the stairs. Already two thirds down, Aeka used the next steps to make it look like she hadn't been running at all.  
  
"Sasami, I heard another voice, do we have company."  
  
"No sis, didn't you recognize it; 'Brother Yosho' has finally taken Grandfather's place at the shrine." She began to giggle, wondering what on earth Aeka could have been so worried about.  
  
"Oh." Aeka moved her hand to her mouth, slow and unsettled. "That was today?"  
  
Sasami giggled fully and scooped up a large pile of lettuce.  
  
"Yeah, I was so surprised I dropped the salad. Jurai makes good holograms."  
  
"I see."  
  
Aeka made her way to the kitchen, some bits of celery were fresh and crisp beneath her house shoes. Sasami only giggled again.  
  
"He's down in the lab now, showing Washu his new suit."  
  
Aeka leaned over the counter and began pulling wilted flowers from the vase. Her blinks were long then lethargic as she spoke softly to Sasami through herself.  
  
"I think it may be his 'old' suit, dear. And I'd imagine she's already seen it."  
  
***  
  
"Washu?" Yosho spoke to the mass of machinery at the end of a poorly lit path, his delicate throat matching tender feet. He began recalling his school days back on Jurai, the technology classes in particular. Memories of things he'd heard about the legendary "Mad Professor Hakube" soon followed.  
  
*"She kept specimens around who sometimes "accidentally" ate the students."  
  
*"Once, my friend's uncle's landlord, he said she once gave a lecture on how to turn an entire planet's population female in under a week."  
  
*"Every time one of her experiments failed, she turned her assistants into tiny little frog people."  
  
*"She could have built a weapon to destroy the whole galaxy if she'd wanted to."  
  
*"I heard she had the biggest-"  
  
Yosho shook his head and pinched his sinus. Ahead of him was strange enough equipment to easily replace any rumor with a better one. The hum of energy grew steadily louder while the lights seemed to fade about randomly, yet still he didn't notice anything like scientific activity.  
  
"Washu?"  
  
But this was no time for nervous throats. A few more steps and he'd be able to touch that imposing pillar of wires and glass, if he wanted to.  
  
"Washu?" It was louder, so there really should have been more of an echo.  
  
Turning toward a wall of polished steel, his rusty green reflection glanced around for some robot sensor to point accusingly at his presence. After one last look at the tiny strip of light leading from over his shoulder back into darkness, he tried to remember that some parts of her former lab had actually been beautiful. Braving a breath for courage, he strode toward a space he might be able to walk through.  
  
Sure enough, between the green steel, and what he imagined was a large, metal, storage sphere of sorts, there was space enough for him to move toward a dead end of more wires and even more black glass. For a good five minutes he circled the meeting of machinery at a respectable distance. Adjusting his glasses, he looked up crude towers of cable and down organic twists of silver talons, each with rings of glowing plasma that brightened in color as they moved from base to tip. Eventually he was looking down a narrow space between two walls of light gray iron connected above by a series of crisscrossed arches. .  
  
Not knowing if his annoyance was directed at his nervousness or covering it up, Yosho let them both go. Small lights dotted the walls on either side of him, reflecting from nowhere or impossibly swimming beneath the surface of the metal. The beeps of larger machines welcomed him, no warnings or alarms yet. Each step forward managed to encourage the next. They were just overgrown computers, probably, and the door ahead would lead to Washu, hopefully. Why had Tenchi always seemed so hesitant to come down here? A thought crossed his mind as he neared what he assumed to be the center of the lab.  
  
*But her lab was destroyed, wasn't it? Maybe this is an entirely new set up, or just a spare.  
  
He'd have to save his questions till after the tour; a circle of the floor had detached and begun to rise up with a cylindrical tube beneath it. The caretaker would be emerging from it shortly, that or a vicious cyborg programmed to dispatch intruders without a trace. Better-than-glass plastic shook and shimmered as it moved forward and slid over itself, opening the little elevator to whatever floor they were really on.  
  
Washu stepped out in an unfamiliar suit entirely fitted to her child's form. The humble emerald weave and sharp black rims surprised him, but her folded arms and lowered head caught his attention. He forgot all about the new surroundings and tried to remember that monk of so many years ago, the one who could drain his face to make every funeral procession seem joyful, even the ones pretending to be. It had seemed more than simply a release of distractions, but a draining, a hole bored at the base of him to let everything spill away. His meditations had all been more like little suicides. The memory contained specters of someone comparing peace to emptiness, but Washu looked up before he could recognize the voice and in time to interrupt the chill. She put his look of surprise to shame in half the time.  
  
"Yosho!"  
  
Her hands fell to her sides and she took a quarter step back defensively. Yosho nearly clutched his chest for the exhausted eyes searching him. Something inside, something very old and formal was chiding him for not knocking louder and waiting for her to open the door. He stood a bit straighter, then a mite taller, reacting to surprise defensively, just like she always did. The younger-looking priest thought on this before forcing himself to relax again.  
  
"Hello, Washu. I hope I'm not intruding."  
  
Washu's mouth wavered in hesitation till it clamped shut, deepening a frown that turned to the wall on her left. A large screen appeared in the shadow of a button and switch carnival. She decided on the buttons, and from the sound of it they were in serious need of discipline, or replacement.  
  
"I should have known you were here already. This hunk of junk was ^supposed^ to tell me."  
  
Contrary to instinct, Yosho didn't guard against the possibility of Washu recycling one or another of her elaborately intimidating hunks of junk. Instead he stepped close, then behind her. True to centuries of priesthood, her distress helped him focus.  
  
"Ah, I see, you ^tried^ to tell me he was here, but ^this^ mess  
wouldn't let you."  
  
Washu deepened her frown as she sidestepped and marched past her visitor to a totem poll of circuit boxes, circuit globes, and circuits. Yosho considered suggesting that she might be putting more focus into the problem than was needed, but he merely followed with patient steps. If Washu felt comfortable treating these machines like B-movie props then they couldn't be too dangerous.  
  
"Sorry," she sighed a half-sincere self-reprimand, "I guess the lab's not as close to full potential as I let on." Born between the shells of a laugh and a sarcastic grunt, the noise in her mouth seemed to brighten her mood a little. "It's a good thing you didn't stray off the path."  
  
"Oh, and why is that?" Yosho asked, instantly regretting an almost patronizing tone.  
  
"Hm, because you could have ended up wandering around in the darkness for who knows how long. I haven't exactly filled in all the spaces yet."  
  
"I see."  
  
Washu ignored his calm and nearly broke something plastic in frustration.  
  
"There. Now I should have a system worthy of the greatest genius---on a backwater planet, at least."  
  
It wasn't really sarcasm, so he didn't really laugh, and tried not to frown. Again she kept her eyes averted as she moved on to another half- circle of machines. His growing concern decided to keep a safe distance this time; each of her adjustments sharpened claw-like sensors formed from a material clearly meant to remain amorphous.  
  
"So what can I do ya for?" Washu was barely trying to sound more chipper than she really was, but her choice of words put Yosho back where he'd started.  
  
"Um, I beg your pardon."  
  
"Just an expression."  
  
"I see."  
  
"Yes, seems like 'you see' a lot," she lazily mocked his tone, "heck, I bet you don't even need those silly spectacles anymore."  
  
Cross-eyed with momentary indignity, Yosho took of his glasses and began to clean them, frowning back at whatever was holding him and whatever she was holding.  
  
"I take it the exchange is official now, Grandpa Katshuhito for Uncle Yosho."  
  
She was speaking fluidly but in an almost jaded monotone, like a doctor who'd stopped caring ten patients ago. Maybe he could break through with some matched curtness.  
  
"'Cousin' might work best, actually."  
  
"Mmm," Washu tapped robotically on a single button. "So, now you know that it's best not to walk into my lab without knocking?"  
  
"I---yes, I understand."  
  
"Good, that's better than just 'seeing'."  
  
With that she was off toward another station, still no glance in his direction, even less interest in his presence.  
  
*Is she angry with me? But why would she be angry with me? She's the one whose been limiting the depth of our conversations and spending so much time down here.  
  
*Keep talking to her Yosho, listen to your soul; it's saying privacy is what she wants but not what she needs.  
  
"I was going to come down here earlier this morning." Yosho's voice almost became formal as he steered back toward the point.  
  
"Just to tell me about the switch? Why didn't you then? For that matter, why didn't you just tell me at dinner last night."  
  
Yosho's offended frown couldn't even deflate completely. He took a deep enough breath to stretch his face smooth, calm, and ready to endure. Centuries of composed fighters defeating enraged ones couldn't be wrong.  
  
"You didn't join us for dinner last night, you remained here. And I didn't come down to tell you what would be obvious enough."  
  
Washu finally looked ready to turn to him, but she was just looking at another screen, directly above her head.  
  
"So what's so important that you couldn't tell me after breakfast, but that you couldn't wait to tell me at lunch."  
  
The confusion that suddenly replaces anger is complete, but Yosho inwardly shook himself to his senses and some precious wit.  
  
"Well for one, Sasami said that lunch will probably be a little late."  
  
"And?"  
  
The ice was stubborn, but iron was iron. It was time to redirect his opponent's energy.  
  
"And I'd like it if you faced me when we spoke."  
  
Washu was silent again, hovering her fingers above buttons she likely didn't need to push. Yosho had become almost impatient enough to fold his arms by the time she turned around, but her face was so pitifully apologetic that he would have now preferred to hold her while they spoke.  
  
The light finally accentuated the bags under her eyes and the almost sallow quality of her skin. On a child the expression was even worse. A few solid blinks temporarily replaced it with a semi-polite version of her own patience.  
  
"There are some things that you've been reluctant to speak about while up at the shrine, I had hoped you might feel more at ease in your lab."  
  
Washu accepted his balanced smile like an extra blanket on a summer night and lowered her eyes before walking toward him.  
  
"I doubt it, but since you've already come this far let's give it a shot." Passing him without a whisper of enthusiasm or thought of contact, she stepped toward the still idling elevator. A few points of color lit up where she touched it. Yosho stepped toward her in hopes that he might catch her eyes again before he tried to make good on the promise he'd made and remade to himself.  
  
"Step inside."  
  
Yosho followed her gesture into the elevator then waited for her to see his confusion before he had to voice it. After a few moments she simply stepped in first.  
  
"This isn't my lab, these are just some mediocre surveillance and scanning equipment I put out here to keep Mihoshi busy. Hopefully I won't need the spare parts."  
  
After biting his tongue on the reflex to say "I see", Yosho realized that he didn't, didn't see how they were both going to fit in that little elevator and didn't see how he was going to pull her out of her shell if she was already inviting him into it. Space and air enough, or not, he approached with his head held high and cool.  
  
"Watch your head."  
  
Officially tired of hearing her make jokes she found no humor in, he ducked inside with an almost formal motion, glad there was basically enough room as they sank below the floor. The small light inside was even dimmer for the portion of his head that obscured it, but it was plain to see that there was nothing to look at outside the elevator save a tight mass of noodle metal. It reminded him of the time he'd taken Tenchi to the museum to walk around inside a real submarine, he'd been thankful then that his grandson hadn't asked him how fast it could go, or how big a boat it could blow up. He wondered if Washu wasn't crossing her fingers for a similar blessing.  
  
Loose hair was taking up a good portion of her space, and only the top parts of her body were visible. Such close proximity without a chance of intimate communication, it began to seem a little too convenient. Yosho considered asking her why she hadn't stayed in adult form, then realized that there probably wouldn't be room enough in the elevator if she were any larger. After looking down in the uncomfortable silence for a while, a side curiosity began pressing on his mind.  
  
"Washu," Yosho began clearly and politely enough to confirm that ^he^ wasn't the one widening any gaps between them.  
  
The Universe's own little genius cradled her fingers behind his neck and pulled him down. He gulped and widened his eyes but didn't pull away or withhold a response. It didn't last long or likely change whatever expression only the floor could see.  
  
"Sorry if that was too strange, but the real old new face really is handsome, and I've missed you." The matter-of-fact monotone said nothing for the romance of close spaces and would have sounded like apathetic line reading if the kiss hadn't been so believable. "Besides, the elevator wouldn't fit the both of us."  
  
"Alright then," Yosho scraped up a smile, "so long as no one saw."  
  
Washu didn't respond, but he didn't think it especially funny himself.  
  
The descent lengthened and quieted. Eventually even the well-meditated former prince felt the need for a childish question or empty conversation.  
  
"This outfit looks nice, is it new?"  
  
"Excuse me?"  
  
Before he could pull anything from her tone, a change in light outside the elevator turned Yosho's head and kept his eyes. A vast chamber had opened all around them and, if he was right to assume the tube ran down the center, it's radius was at least a kilometer. He all but pressed his nose to the window to get a better look.  
  
It would not have struck him as so fantastic if it had just been another huge clutter of circuits and wires, too finely detailed to take in more than the mere size. Instead they were encircled by a procession of semi transparent structures, each wide as a small skyscraper and shaped with drawn out hills and valleys like the legs of rich European furniture. Smooth steel sunk between them like a thick gelatin they'd all struggled through, and reflected the tiny thread elevator light. Large rings of pulsing green energy slid down the structures in perfect and silent unison. They conformed to the changing shape of the tubes like drops of mercury and caught Yosho near hypnosis.  
  
"Don't give this reactor too much credit, I'll be upgrading it to a smaller and more efficient model the second I get a chance." Washu sounded as annoyed with his overwhelmed reaction as she was with her oversized reactor.  
  
Yosho leaned back slightly and looked down. They were descending faster, thus the chamber was even larger than he'd thought. Still, when they breached the bottom and went through another layer of mundane pipes, he barely felt their elevator slow to a stop.  
  
The door slid open and Washu stepped out into complete darkness, quickly welcomed by a path of simple floor lights. Yosho followed, checking either side habitually and finding the same nothing that had not welcomed him when he'd first entered.  
  
"Where are we now?"  
  
"My lab, of course."  
  
"But," Yosho bit his tongue and picked up his pace. He looked over Washu's head as far as he could see, but the path only lit up another meter for every step she took.  
  
"I would expect even a ^young^ priest to have a little more patience."  
  
This time he wanted to smile, and almost did, but for the tiniest fraction of light. A two-dimensional oval appeared, just a fraction blacker than their surroundings. Washu kept walking as he practically ground his heels into the floor. She lifted a hand and disappeared into the portal as mundanely as someone swinging through a saloon door. The familiar sound of holographic laptop buttons did little to beckon him, even if they did seem to be just beyond the shroud.  
  
"Don't be silly Yosho, this subspace passage is no more dangerous than those big slippery steps you walk up all the time."  
  
Lips twisted to the side, self and situation sigh contained, Yosho ducked in after her. The glow of the path behind him was only gone a second before he had to squint. Bold light charged down from a ceiling high as the Misaki living room. Something like checkered panels of opaque bubbly plastic, but Yosho wasn't going to endure another upward glance. Even after his eyes adjusted, the light mimicked a bright sun so well that the absence of indoor plants seemed a waste. In fact there was nothing decorative about the lab, no old photos or empty sculptures, not even any trophies. There was a metal cabinet on short legs that claimed the center two thirds of the right wall, but no papers or equipment strewn about it. For the sake of already germinated drama, he wondered if it had been filled to more or less than its visual capacity.  
  
The room was almost too big for an executive office, but was surely too small for a genius's lab. Yosho watched Washu type at the opposite end of the room, sitting on a large and cradling chair supported by spindly rollers that only whispered against the floor as she paused to stretch. The current keyboard was not a hologram, but a series of lights spread across the bottom of an inverted obsidian pyramid, also too large for the room.  
  
Stepping closer, loudly enough to not be sneaking, Yosho snuck a look at the horizontal screen. The picture shifted from meaningless strings of code to images flashed by too rapidly to assemble.  
  
"I must say; it's not what I expected." Yosho began looking around for a place to sit, while Washu continued typing away. He sensed something approaching from behind and turned to see a larger but otherwise identical chair rolling into him.  
  
"It's not what I'm used to either. But a lack of aesthetics helps me concentrate, sometimes."  
  
She turned and faced him, arms on the armrests, head against the headrest, and sunken eyes locked with his. Yosho averted his gaze this time, looking around at a similar nothing and gradually admitting to himself that he'd made a mistake. What should have been obvious the moment she invited him into the elevator was now painfully clear: he'd get from her what she'd already prepared to give, and not a thing more.  
  
Faithfully or stubbornly, he forwardly searched her eyes for some clue to this relapse of withdrawal. It could be that hiding herself was easier than hiding the true effects of Ryoko's departure, that would certainly be the simplest answer. Maybe she wouldn't expect him to broach the subject again after making it so clear that he was a powerless outsider within her sterile controlled environment. She was still waiting for him to speak, fearlessly displaying an emotional wall as advertisement of something hidden behind it. If she was indeed hoping for someone bold enough to relieve a burdening secret, then he'd at least have to try. Besides, he always lost when they tried to see who would break a silence first.  
  
"Washu, do you remember what was happening when last you were spending inordinate amounts of time in the lab." Yosho began the interrogation, trying to make the witness believe she was not a suspect.  
  
"Yes." She answered in kind, though he fully expected her to remind the imbecile of necessary repairs.  
  
"Then I don't need to tell you about everyone's concern."  
  
Washu made a point not to shift her eyes or even her feet.  
  
"With all due respect, I don't think you are in a position to speak for 'everyone'."  
  
Yosho tried to hold equally still, but Washu did better, invisibly crossing her hands and softening her mouth. She spoke again; the sublime feminine ability to cry for comfort while screaming for solitude kept him and cowed him indecisive.  
  
"With all due affection, I'm only interested in ^your^ concerns."  
  
Taking a shorter blink and breath, he hoped to throw her off guard by treating her defenses as attacks.  
  
"Well then, could you please step out of your child form first?"  
  
For a moment, Washu seemed to be admiring his face, distracting herself with his increasingly familiar features. If this weren't intentional, her lowered gaze to a small cracking knuckle certainly was. The depressed motion, and more so the sickly sound, made Yosho ready for bold or no further action.  
  
"It wouldn't make a difference."  
  
True to her word and committed to her form; it didn't. For all his experience, for any of his tentative reuse of youthful charm, Yosho could only think of all the ways and ages to be on either side of patronized.  
  
***  
  
"Dammit, the food here is horrible."  
  
Gen Ibana shook his head down at the contents of his long-reusable cafeteria tray. No doubt about it: he was eating the same surprise they'd served last month.  
  
"Blasted---wah can I jush bing mah own?" A few crumbs fell out of his mouth, followed by a few more slapped off his hands. He turned in his chair and looked at a large collection of small monitors, each displaying a different figure in an identical room.  
  
"Becaursh ah ooh lot," Gen gulped and wiped his lips roughly, "^that's^ why."  
  
He spun himself away so hard that he had to walk himself and the chair back to the desk he wasn't supposed to be eating on. A sigh and a grunt gave out disgust and took another large mouthful. This time he was determined to barely taste it before swallowing, belching, and tasting it again. When he chuckled at this it sounded slightly less indulgent than when he resumed complaining.  
  
"I eat their food near all this expensive equipment and I get a slap on the wrist," he reached for another bite but gave the table a dead slap instead, "but lil' Amar keeps a damn calorie bar in his locker and gets ^demoted^."  
  
Standing with careful attention to the weight of his guts, Gen hobbled over to two compartments that really shouldn't have been in a place where food wasn't allowed. He shook leftovers down to incineration and dropped the tray into sterilization.  
  
"Now I gotta train the new guy," he looked up at the monitor on an adjacent wall, "who's on his way now."  
  
Gen began repeating the same sentence to himself, enjoying the sound of lethargy-intoxication.  
  
"Train the new guy. Train the ^new^ guy. Thenewguy. Theneeeeeeeewguy. Train the new new guy---guy------guy."  
  
An entirely desexualized female voice responded to the rapid beeps of a door code.  
  
"Observation post 2-8-red now admitting security personnel---Feingun, Malek".  
  
"The New Guy!"  
  
Gen held out his arms and a yawning smile with just enough exaggerated hospitality to take the scrawny new guard off duty.  
  
"Uh. Hi."  
  
"Welcome to the greatest show in the galaxy. Here, have a seat, in fact, have my seat."  
  
Malek barely caught the chair before it collided with his knees and sat in it hesitantly while Gen plopped himself down in the one with newer padding.  
  
"My name is-" a stiff hand quickly went limp.  
  
"Feingun, Malek." Gen's impersonation of the computer's voice sounded unintentionally perverse, unintentional because he wasn't even looking at the new guy anymore.  
  
"Yeah." Malek walked the chair toward what he assumed was his half of the station.  
  
"Now, they expect me to show you the ropes, but I figure they already paid you for 2 weeks of training, so I'll just spare us both my people skills and answer your questions as they come---and you'd better ask them when they do."  
  
"Alright."  
  
Malek answered Gen's cynical bluntness with indifference, obviously hoping it would make the man either civil or silent. Of course Gen, being a curmudgeon veteran, ate this tactic for bad cafeteria dessert. Before the new guy could begin comparing the real equipment to the practice model, Gen contradicted himself with a wide and wise-guy gesture. He held his hands up to the monitors with the adoration of someone selling a simple and soulless work of art for a small fortune.  
  
"I've been watching these same screens for more than twenty years now, and I'm no Jurain. This is by far the cushiest job you can land if you know how to keep your eyes open...and if you aren't too shaken by the idea of watching deadly maniacs rot in sterilized boxes...^and^ if you aren't here to ^get off^ on watching deadly maniacs rot in sterilized boxes.  
  
"These poor souls, these 'soulless monsters who don't deserve to escape execution', are all here indefinitely. The theory is that by cutting them off from almost all external stimulation they'll eventually go back close enough to blank to forget how deranged they are and be moved to a less expensive security block. The practice, however, is that we don't give the demons in their heads anything to eat, that way they just eat themselves--- so that they can be moved to a less expensive security block."  
  
Gen almost stopped for a breath that could have made him sigh, slouch, or otherwise botch the sale.  
  
"None of them are allowed to mix with the general population, or even each other. Each one of the 'patients' here had to be restrained by military grade ^force^. The reason we don't get any stun sticks or restraining fields is not because this is the safest watch, but because there's nothing we could carry around that would do us a damn bit of good if any of them got loose. We got the alert button on our belt, but my hunch is that it won't save anybody but the people ^outside^ this sector. You hear what I'm saying?"  
  
Malek looked at him blankly, but Gen kept at the screens.  
  
"They are not allowed to write or read letters. I've only ever received a handful of mail for anyone here, and they've always been obvious bad jokes. There actually used to be supervised visitations---a few decades before I started working here. I never asked why they stopped."  
  
Gen frowned; he'd fine-tuned that speech a lot since the last time he'd needed to give it. Towards the end he'd begun to hear the miserable air of it all creep into his throat, but didn't even think to pull up. Now the new guy already knew how much he hated this job, everything it watched over, and some of what it protected. So far this kid was silent, maybe another guard had already given him a similar introduction.  
  
"What are the exceptions?" Malek asked with all the cold iron certainty of a spy slowly revealing all that he isn't supposed to know.  
  
Gen turned slowly toward him with a nearly insulted sneer. Malek wasn't going to flinch or even move till he got his answer. But that was fine, Gen told himself, that's what made good security. Without another word, Gen turned back to his side of the monitors, checking different angles and zooming in a seemingly random pattern. Malek did the same and they both repeated the procedure for two silent hours, exactly how much time Gen figured he'd give the new guy to apologize for asking such a thing.  
  
"You know Feingun, there is nobody watching the watchers on this level, not while we're in here anyway. They expect us to make small talk about a patient's rumors, or bigheaded talk about every patient here. That's because there's nothing else to talk about; we might as well be watching paint dry behind vacuum barriers for all the harm we could do from in here. Our presence is a formality, but finding someone to be this close to them is hard, so they pay us pretty good, or at least they pay me and every other person who can keep cool for a month.  
  
"The only people ever going near those---containment units, are us when hell freezes over and we get legitimate clearance, and the ^owners^ of this facility, different times, once a year."  
  
No response from the new guy, but defiantly no sign of having fully absorbed the little speech Gen barely believed he'd have to give. Maybe someone decided the job called for more than trustworthy nobodies. Maybe he should try to read his face after all.  
  
Malek was still looking at him, same unmoving blankness.  
  
"There is always an exception."  
  
Gen looked ready to spit, then turned back to the screens, leaning forward slightly as he swallowed.  
  
"Alright smart guy, take a look at patient 96 in room B."  
  
Malek frowned in slight annoyance.  
  
"She hasn't moved for the past two hours."  
  
"She hasn't moved for the past two days, but that's fairly normal around here."  
  
Uninspired silence urged Gen on, a devious smile held in tightly for moral support.  
  
"Have you ever heard of Prince Yosho?"  
  
"Isn't he some sort of religious icon on Jurai?"  
  
"You could say that. Then I take it you know his claim to fame."  
  
Malek narrowed his eyes at the screen and spoke with a little more interest as he moved the camera in closer.  
  
"Chased off that space pirate, the one the GP could hardly photograph?"  
  
Gen smiled up the side of his face Malek was on and spoke plainly.  
  
"And the one a third of the GP brought to us."  
  
The smile broke into the other side of his face as he heard his coworker's expression collapse like a card castle. He decided he didn't need to survey the damage.  
  
"That's Kagato's--- that's Ryoko?" Malek tried to hide his shock behind skepticism, but Gen didn't even consider it.  
  
"This is one of the only places in the galaxy with the facilities to hold her. Life forms with her kind of power are put in asylums rather than prisons so that, should they escape, they have a less manageable army at their disposal."  
  
"So they finally caught her, after more than 700 years." Malek tried to chuckle with immunity.  
  
"Not exactly, a couple months ago she just flew right into a GP hanger and started blastin' about. She was doing surprisingly minor damage, but they didn't even try to get close till they had an antimatter containment field. She went straight from a religious figure, into ^that^." Gen pointed bitterly at the screen.  
  
Malek narrowed his gaze again and smiled with more convincing deviousness than Gen could have managed, if he'd wanted to.  
  
"Isn't it kind of dangerous, letting anyone know that she's ^alive^--- and ^here^. Correct me if I'm wrong but; doesn't the majority of Jurai society revolve around the idea that their heroic prince vanquished her." There was no irony in his bad sarcasm, or in Gen's response.  
  
"You'll be contacted by Jurai intelligence today, probably on your lunch break. They know what kind of soap you used last year."  
  
Silence, thick enough to hear their fingertips on the monitor controls on every side of patient 96. It endured for the better quarter of an hour before Malek worked up his nerve again.  
  
"So 'J.I.' comes down to keep tabs on her?"  
  
"No." Gen mimicked Malek's earlier monotone.  
  
"They send a GP connection?"  
  
"No."  
  
Malek scowled out the side of his face Gen was on, and went back to work for a shorter stretch of silence.  
  
"It's just one person, right?"  
  
Gen assumed his silence would give him the right kind of affirmation.  
  
"Somebody with connections?"  
  
Same silence as the same response.  
  
"Somebody I'd have heard of."  
  
Gen wondered if he could say 'no' with an equal and opposite silence, but gave up.  
  
"If you're a science buff."  
  
Malek scratched his chin like a cricket broadcasting how smart it was, or would be in just a moment. Gen watched him begin to smile and wanted a canon to shoot down whatever guess he'd constructed.  
  
"You know, I remember an old teacher of mine discussing science ethics off topic. He said something about a bunch of professors who tried making these practically invincible people by mixing their genes with some kind of water sponge. He said it was just before they had strict regulations for all that kind of thing, and long after only one scientist had done it."  
  
Malek was pausing for effect rather than a collection of thoughts. Gen prepared to smack both out of him.  
  
"Yeah, she was in some book of records, crazy like a foxy," Malek laughed alone at his observation, "damn, that was a while ago. She must be full Jurain."  
  
Gen wanted the punk to finish guessing close or give up before he lost his temper.  
  
"So you think she's just checking up on ooold projects?"  
  
"It's her daughter."  
  
"Huh?" Malek went from smart for his age to his age. He glanced over, accusing Gen of misinformation as rudely as he could without cursing. It was enough to clench the older man's fist.  
  
"Her daughter."  
  
"Who, the visitor's or-"  
  
Gen was too upset now to enjoy however stupid Malek may have felt for following up with such a question. He just sighed, and hoped J.I. would make him soil himself before the day was out.  
  
Another silence dug in, short and more than complete for the resentment rising between the two guards. It was clear to Gen soon enough that his future, or rather, 'current' partner had been waiting for him to notice the close attention now being paid to room B. Soon as the voyeur realized he had an audience of his own, he ignored it and let it hear him talk to himself through a weak but haughty scoff.  
  
"Damn, she really does look like hell."  
  
Gen responded with all the monotone he could play off.  
  
"Malek."  
  
Same excess indifference from the new guy.  
  
"Yeah?"  
  
No more jokes from the veteran.  
  
"Shut the hell up."  
  
***  
  
"Hey, Sasami. Hey, Mihoshi."  
  
"Hi, Tenchi!" They answered in bright unison without taking their eyes off the television.  
  
"Hello, Aeka." Voice softened, step slowed, Tenchi approached the dining table. The First Princess was reading a small book the way he'd seen many students study references in the library. She didn't look up either.  
  
"Hello, Tenchi."  
  
"Um, how can you read with the TV on in the same room?"  
  
"If I'm interested in something enough I don't let anything distract me."  
  
*If she's acting meek like this to make me feel sorry for her, then we've a lot of work to do. But...if she just said that to make me feel guilty, then I'm in serious trouble.  
  
Tenchi considered trying to read over her shoulder semi-playfully, but walked over to the couch instead.  
  
"Has anyone seen Gran---er, ^uncle^ Yosho?"  
  
Sasami giggled.  
  
"Yeah, he's-"  
  
The closet door opened, and Yosho closed it behind him so as not to wake a sensitive baby. Tenchi tried to smile at the tired look on his young grandfather's face. The closer this new instructor came, the more futile, then inappropriate his efforts began to feel.  
  
"Hey, uncle Yosho. How's-"  
  
"Tenchi, would you walk me back to the shrine please?"  
  
"Um," he looked around to make sure everyone else heard the forcefully calmed seriousness in Yosho's voice. Aeka had seemed to, but quickly buried herself back in the book. Tenchi began walking alongside his grandfather, watching only the ground before him.  
  
The late afternoon smelled like a good day's progress in the fields and the promise of a hearty dinner. By the time they reached the steps, Yosho was almost ready to surrender another stretch of silence, but his grandson proved more eager.  
  
"Well?"  
  
Tenchi's voice was unusually frank and non-dramatic. It might have sounded rude had he been a few years younger.  
  
"Tenchi, is it better to receive a gift as a surprise, or to know one is waiting for you?"  
  
Short frown contemplating out into worry, Tenchi looked over at his grandfather, hoping he wouldn't really be expected to answer.  
  
"It depends, I guess."  
  
"No, it doesn't."  
  
"Okay."  
  
Tenchi knew that had been rude, but didn't feel a disapproving stare.  
  
"More specifically, it makes less a difference for the person receiving the gift than the one presenting it."  
  
"I don't understand. What does this have to do with Washu?"  
  
"Nothing, if you don't even try to see the connection."  
  
This new instructor didn't have his contemplative questions ordered as well the last. Tenchi had been delayed with enough of them to know when they were just a way to distract or stall.  
  
*Distract or stall...  
  
"Washu is withdrawing from us for reasons other than the repair of her lab. In fact, she didn't even bother giving that as an excuse."  
  
"So you think she's making us a present?" Tenchi poured his heart into hiding his doubt in a hopeful smile, but was ready to dispose of it with one look from his teacher. And he disposed of it. In short moments he was slightly ashamed for not noticing sooner, how his thoughts were so preoccupied with what might be wrong with him and Aeka, but most likely him, that he'd hardly noticed Washu.  
  
"No, Tenchi. She is concealing something from us in plain view, hoping we will want to unveil it before we are permitted."  
  
"Did you? 'Unveil it', I mean." Tenchi asked after a hard silence.  
  
"No, but I want you to try tomorrow."  
  
"Me?" Tenchi stopped walking and looked at his young uncle like a suddenly senile grandfather. "But-but I thought you would be...you know, closer to her. If you can't find out what's going on how do you expect me to?"  
  
Yosho kept walking and speaking with the same calm, but a little more sadness.  
  
"She is an uncommonly intelligent woman, as you must know. If she intended to hide something she would first figure out how to hide it from those closest to her, or undercut their will to search. I should have expected this. Now I can only hope that, since you're the last person she'd expect to sneak into her fortress, she might just let you in."  
  
"But---but you can't expect me to get in ^her^ head." Tenchi almost laughed as he trotted after Yosho, catching up in good time.  
  
"I don't, and neither does she. That is why you must try."  
  
"Alright." The anti-enthusiasm in Tenchi's voice made his grandfather stop and turn.  
  
"I take it I don't need to tell you how important this might be." Tenchi was filled with foreboding, despite the lack of it in Yosho's voice. The new priest turned to finish the trek alone, sure that his pupil would take none of their conversation lightly.  
  
"Oh, and Tenchi."  
  
"Yes, Yosho?"  
  
He caught his throat and bent it back into shape, then reflexively glanced about for what he did not know, now hardly a new or thinned-out habit. But uncle Yosho paid no notice, speaking instead like a concerned grandfather.  
  
"I'm not sure how much her lab may have changed since the last time you were in there, but it was very dark."  
  
Tenchi nodded to his grandfather's back and hurried down the steps, letting himself think only when he was halfway home.  
  
***  
  
"It's 4 thousand, right?" Malek asked his watch casually as he stood into a stretch.  
  
"By my clock." Gen similarly tried to ignore any animosity they may have built or any informality they might plan.  
  
"I'm off to lunch then." Pushing the seat neatly back in place, Malek began walking toward the door, turning after a few steps. "So they really don't allow any outside food in the whole facility?"  
  
"Most high security places don't."  
  
"Alright then, where's the cafeteria?" Malek asked with a juvenile sigh.  
  
Gen considered a few curt and or clever answers, but eventually decided not to change things.  
  
"Third floor."  
  
Malek clicked his tongue and confirmed Gen's suspicion that a connection had landed him this job.  
  
"Where on the third floor."  
  
Gen turned in his chair.  
  
"You can't-"  
  
Washu stepped out of her special brand of cloaked subspace portals, dressed in a doctor's dead teal coat and a widow's large indoor sunglasses. If she weren't early, a child, and in an area nobody wanted to think about, she would have been very convincing.  
  
"-miss her." Gen's voice wilted in his throat as he stared behind Malek with eyes frozen before they could widen.  
  
Malek's expression jumped from perturbed to shocked confusion as he turned to look down. A strange little girl in a restricted area who was waiting impatiently for him to stand aside? This had to be a bad joke.  
  
"I take it this is the new kid on the block." Washu spoke to Gen humorlessly, regarding Malek's presence as little more than a photograph.  
  
"Professor Ha-"  
  
Washu walked around the obstacle and toward its chair.  
  
"Is everything in order?"  
  
"Yes but-" Gen's fear bordered on the cusp of career and life and something more precious.  
  
"I apologize for arriving earlier than usual, you can explain the details to him while I'm down there." She leaned back and folded her arms without expression. "Stall me more time from now on."  
  
"Hm, I thought you'd been given the okay on her," Malek cracked his fingers together in a confident basket, "but it looks like she's got you on a commission, eh Gen?"  
  
Gen stared at him as if he'd just asked an emperor to swap wives.  
  
"What, afraid you'll have to share the cut? I'm sure Professor--- Professor-"  
  
Malek watched her materialize a holo-laptop and begin typing robotically. She spoke to the screen, drained, dreary, and past fear.  
  
"Call me Little Washu."  
  
"Little ^what^?"  
  
"Feingun! Stop. Talking. Take a break and forget about this before-"  
  
"Before what? I don't care how much seniority you have, Gen, I always know ^everything^ about my job. So, somebody start explaining fast so I don't miss all of my lunch."  
  
Gen hung his head and Washu answered in an unchanged tone.  
  
"I have an arrangement with Jurain Intelligence; your mother's lawyer is visiting in a month to discuss her will. She planned to split the money between you and your half-sister."  
  
The sound of Malek's silence made Gen raise his head to search for the color in the younger man's face. He had a feeling that few people knew about this passing and fewer about this half-sister, this half-brother not included. Watching the kid shuffle wordlessly out the door would have to wait, though.  
  
"I'm going in now Gen, I might even be done a bit later than usual."  
  
Gen nodded and kept his eyes averted while Washu walked over to the door he'd never had to open. She nearly stood on tiptoe to hold up a card to the retinal scanner.  
  
***  
  
It didn't take long for Washu to begin taking her newly acquired time, delaying steps toward the cage her daughter had put herself in. Spacious corridors with nothing but the sound she made were nothing new, but the space between the cells and the rest of the facility would not transmit sound. These units had been specially designed to confine beings that could not be held by solid matter or would require energy fields far too costly to maintain. The solution was a collection of rounded white cubes that wobbled like gelatin sculptures in nonexistent breeze, like artificial organs chaotically trying to breath or gestate. Each of them were identically attached to the insultingly sky blue ceiling by mundane black umbilical tubes large enough to exchange surveillance equipment, maintenance, and a small child. Washu hated how they reminded her of the inflatable playpen she'd seen kids bouncing around in at one of the local earth fairs.  
  
The security of these bubbles was not elasticity or simply reflecting energy thrown at them, though both had been tried in earlier designs. Perpetual dimensional flux was a well-kept secret, a conductive bladder that would stretch a subspace portal around an object, in this case a simple prison-like room. The portals were designed to constantly battle with themselves; every nanosecond a new empty storage space would fail, collapse, and implode, expelling all matter. Anything that tried to exit the membrane would be thrown back inside from the same point.  
  
Washu remembered being assigned a particularly incompetent team of environmentalists, ethicists, and not one exceptional physicist when asked to design the holding units. Somehow, thorough the paranoia and self- righteousness of her team, she managed to complete a prototype on schedule. But by that time she'd filed it away on the preciously small list of inventions that had unsettled even her. Only once since then had she considered constructing another, only needing a moment to realize its insufficiency.  
  
When she looked at the dozen of them for the first time since their birth, her initial thought had been forcefully self-preserving, indulging, deluding; that Ryoko was safe here. It had been difficult to accept terms of the surrounding world being 'removed' from her, then 'safe' from her. By the time she'd formalized and perfected a procedure for future visits, it was time to return to the original perception; Ryoko was nearly helpless now. Able to move only by thinking of this as temporary, Washu stepped up to the last cell on the right.  
  
In a ritualistic motion, she dragged her gaze up from the floor and held her white card up at an angle to the area where the tube connected. A thread of multicolored light, much like the power signals given off by Jurain trees, extended and touched the tube. It dislodged itself from the ceiling and faced her like a lethargic caterpillar curious to see who had interrupted its feeding. There was only the shine of a subspace portal on the end. Through this came the video feed and the small drones that suggested sustenance, hygiene, and exercise on an exact schedule, but that never gave away the location of the tube's ever-changing entrance point.  
  
Washu thought of Gen watching the collective exteriors and contents of the cells. Right now she assumed he was watching the tube snake its way down and dilate to her height. She had better courtesy than to try and look back at him. After stepping into the tube she would remain in empty subspace till it reconnected and found a new location to put her through. Since she was not a propelled service robot, she once again had to brace for a fall. Somehow, though, she'd never landed directly on the sterile forest green plastic, the hut that boxed in her daughter from the slightly nauseating movement of amorphous cream of portal. The color would have been black if the portals remained active for another hundredth of a nano second.  
  
This was the second time she'd landed a direct few meters from the locked- for-formality door. The vibration of touching, walking on the cell walls was almost too slight to notice. It had taken her an uncommonly short series of arguments to concede that no improvements could be made on the facility. Yet there was still a twinge of raging injustice each time she had to manually unseal the door with her card. This took enough time and created enough noise to make her wonder why she bothered to knock anymore.  
  
*Why bother?  
  
The question appeared in her mind like a theme of itself, a tangible, concentrated God of the very question. It waited for her to bow down or run screaming in terror, full of pride for all she had done recently to fight it off. When the weight of the situation was clear, Washu considered it an extra precaution to invite the question in early, much like a preventative vaccination. Classic medicine or not, her efforts seemed to attract the circling shadow of an enormous vulture that cheered the struggle on. It would land and drip saliva each time she lowered her guard.  
  
Washu closed her eyes and listened to the door seal behind her. Now she was twice sealed against everything save the card that only responded to her DNA and the force that Mihoshi could probably summon if she were upset or daydreaming enough. She cleared her mind before approaching, closed eyes made the first steps easier, the first half of them. Counting opened the floodgates.  
  
Fast as a genius's synapses, she relived every prominent moment, from sharing the destruction inside the GP hanger, to the first visit, to today's near confession and Yosho's quick retreat. Rather than give her strength or inspire a more informed strategy, the string of nightmares and arguments, already overwhelming at their own time, stuck her like a ghost fist. The condensed malady drew blood and killed when it would.  
  
Washu took that first week full in the face, the one without food or sleep, when her daughter told her to leave, not merely to leave her alone. It had been a raw palm wetting the coarse asphalt, smearing the chalk of 'protect' and 'escape' into mud. She'd never thought she'd hear her daughter say it, much less mean it, the way she meant that this was where she belonged.  
  
Right on damnably restrictive hour a week schedule, Washu had returned three consecutive times to an entirely unresponsive doll. Every trick of verbal motivation in every book she couldn't discredit was delivered with the meals her daughter didn't touch and thankfully didn't need. Initially they were paced before her, more impassioned than any lecture Washu could remember. Eventually they were held gently against her limp hand and massaged in through barely coherent sobs of devoted desperation. Finally they were shaken into her shoulders by way of raging vengeance for whatever Ryoko thought she was doing, for every action she wasn't thinking, and for any excuse she might have to put her poor mother through it all.  
  
Washu had stopped herself then, realizing that she'd said 'mother' while intending, she told herself, to say 'family'. Half voluntarily backing away, she had looked at the crumpled toy looking at nothing, and she had slumped down in the opposite corner. Her thoughts were clearer then, focused that while she'd guarded against apathy early on, she'd forgot to do the same for vanity. Her daughter was lying in the wake of a nervous breakdown and she herself was falling into self-pity.  
  
That was when the vulture had appeared, smelling the savory gangrene of doubt, waiting for the better than free lunch. Washu could neither preach nor pray and delude herself into believing she was doing it selflessly. She firmly absolved to only extend her love, the raw flame of a mother's devotion that had risen up from the moment Ryoko displayed her gold to the entire universe. Though cumbersome and foul, Washu allowed herself no desire save holding close and dear what was left of her greatest creation.  
  
There were apologies, then promises, so heartfelt and immediate it hurt to speak them without the filter of her mind. It eventually occurred that this was what she'd intended to communicate through all the pacing, hand holding, and shoulder shaking. Ryoko would remember who she was, and would know all that Washu cared to know: that she loved her daughter as much as any mother could.  
  
It was so very draining to enter this semi-meditative state that Washu lost the energy and hence the confidence to continue arguing with the highest authority in the galaxy. Despite the numbing fury that resulted from this potential savior's enduring response, despite her suspicion that he was inspired by something worse than callousness, she saved her pleas.  
  
Having constructed the prison, a crude breakout plan would have been distantly possible, but when Washu finally gave up bargaining on the outside Ryoko made it clear that she was unable to participate in any kind of action. Despite the all-consuming efforts to draw the poison from her daughter's will, the situation only worsened. In what seemed a kind of monstrous progress, Ryoko had looked up at existence through her mother's face with a dead vehemence that Washu did not want to recognize, announcing that she could not live like a person, and should not have tried to.  
  
What had once been a limp doll was the next week a cowering animal, wailing and clawing pitifully away from whatever came near, trying to fold her face over into her neck. Washu made herself cold again, a necessary step to predict how this ^would^ have happened had it happened back at the Misaki home. The budding hypothesis barely made it out of the cell, a strangling misery transcended to an inward collapse, giving-up impossibly worsened into giving-out.  
  
Washu had clutched her head, holding her daughter's desperate scream like an acid bath. Every memory of joy flared away amid an arch of electricity that struck as a premonition of her own madness. Memories of pain simply blackened thick to melt together a smothering blanket. The professor's own screams were inconsequential till the guard asked her about the pained movements she'd made; her throat had required some minor surgery that night.  
  
On the last visit Ryoko had made no attempt to escape her tentative embrace, tentative because it was difficult not to submerge entirely into their psychic connection at close range. Doing so was worse than staring into Seita's oblivion, she knew, having not made the comparison idly. Her daughter had begun repeating various words in what Washu told herself was a trance slightly above a coma.  
  
No change or promise of such by the end of that session. In Washu, however, there had been an abruptly cool ending to her sympathies and concern for correct motivation. Without a touch or a word, she'd screamed out into the emptying hell of her daughter's mind, announcing her decision to take action that would involve no kind of convention. After that she'd been too exhausted to do more than sit by her daughter's side, still afraid to touch her or to speak and give a word to that haunting trance.  
  
Hardly aware of any time she'd taken to recollect the time she'd spent, Washu slowly opened her eyes to lower the access card. Blank as always, the room was decorated only with strands of cyan hair glued down by Ryoko's fluid to well to be lifted by the cleaners' haste. In the usual corner the only patient that could have ever escaped lay still. Huddled like an emaciated fetus, her eyes and mouth hung open for all the world to turn away from with wails of pitiful horror. The once feared space pirate fully displayed the one fear of conscious things that can match the loss of life.  
  
Washu sat down on the bed across from Ryoko and waited for inspiration, finally exhausted enough to lazily curse every mistake she may have made, and to lazily fight the single surrender she was tempted to make. It could go on this way indefinitely, she knew. It might not be too late, she hoped. After all her science had to offer, and after all they had both survived, she hung her head. Confronted with more choices than even a genius would have expected, she tried not to be afraid. She let herself cry.  
  
Gen watched Malek from the corner of his eye as he took his seat again. He waited with clenched fists, ready for some comment regarding the scene in room B. Their shift continued and ended in silence.  
  
***  
  
In concealed angles of reserved space, midpointed-maintained by conveniently overlooked time, they hide and exist indefinitely for the sake of numerous children; housewarming gifts all day and consolation prizes all night.  
  
That's all they ever want.  
  
Alas, that's all they can have.  
  
Even in a broken family they try to look back with what they believe to be the right mother's eyes.  
  
Not often.  
  
It is enough.  
  
In the absence of a library the army of one and the garden of another still grow.  
  
And in the garden of one, digging in for hard truths, stubborn and ambitious weeds threaten all.  
  
But they were there first, and they have flowers as well.  
  
But it's too much. Can't let them take over again. Have to make sure the bed survives the nightmare. If only the crop could be helped further without being turned into plastic house ornaments. If only that other auntie would stop playing in the mud and come back to help till the soil again, for ^this^ other auntie isn't going to be satisfied with minor pruning for long. She will be coming back again soon, testing post-natural new pesticides and fertilizers, all manners of slash and burn or all crudeness for what wants to grow wild...  
  
That's how ^She^ might have tried to take it back---if She herself hadn't gotten it a little too much too fast.  
  
Have to worry and try harder, this other auntie wouldn't be a mother.  
  
This other auntie would be there soon.  
  
This other auntie was here now, stepping into what only She should be able to, easy as stepping into the shade of a tree.  
  
They were both, and it was all, similar enough.  
  
Not expecting another talk before the roots took or didn't, there could have been surprises for both of them.  
  
Two sisters spoke again.  
  
*Welcome sister, I was not expecting to speak with you again so soon. I was not sure if I'd speak to you directly again.  
  
*You obstructed me---you allow for so many variables, it's a wonder you can predict anything.  
  
*You root out so many possibilities, it's a wonder you can get anything to grow.  
  
*Oh, so you have thorns after all.  
  
*I'm more concerned about my new blossoms.  
  
*You should be more concerned with our sister's buds, and roots.  
  
*Are you?  
  
*Don't condescend me, sister. After all she's heard already she may not be able to accept the loss of her favorite flora.  
  
*It isn't lost yet.  
  
*Isn't it? Your champion doesn't seem to be in any position to save it.  
  
*I'm surprised you don't have more faith in him, considering the trouble you were going through to take him as your own.  
  
*I thought that was behind us.  
  
*I thought it was beneath you.  
  
*...very well. If I still need to redeem myself perhaps I should remedy the situation personally.  
  
*You will do no such thing.  
  
*Are you going to stop me...or am I going to 'stop myself'.  
  
*...  
  
*^You've^ uprooted a problem before, and this ^is^ our problem. We can still work together and at last have our sister with us again.  
  
*No. You made this ^my^ problem, just as you continually threaten to make ^yourself^ my problem. I've already tried to fix it, and I seem to have only helped myself, if that.  
  
*So be it. But the way things are going our sister may "know" without ever "understanding", and if that happens...one of us may follow, and one of us may have to lead. One of us might yet end up truly feeling sorry for the other.  
  
*That, sister, is only a hopeful prediction. And hope has never been your strength.  
  
Other auntie left without saying goodbye. Mother went back to her garden, trying not to worry by trying not to plan, too much. 


	4. Verse Fourteen is Empathy Part 1

Standard Disclaimer:  
  
I thank all the owners of the Tenchi characters who have chosen not to sue me for suggesting some alternative uses for them.  
  
Standard Advertisement:  
  
I thank all the readers who have perused my other submissions and favorite authors.  
  
Standard Procedure:  
  
In keeping conversations civil; substitute religion, and politics, for family.  
  
Tenchi Muyo: Sanctuary and Asylum  
  
-Verse Fourteen is Empathy-  
  
-Part 1-  
  
Bare these necessities, a martyr's teeth.  
  
Embrace for the big bang break.  
  
Turn karma to masochism, all for Us.  
  
Put the selves out and up and at stake.  
  
-ZJS  
  
Queen Funaho's reflection blurred on four surfaces like three dimensions. The rare petrified wood was a treasure that only Jurains could access and not even Jurians could duplicate. And yet if the general public ever discovered how much truly existed its market value would shift dramatically. Wide enough for an escort on each arm and tall enough to give a child a shoulder ride, this tunnel had connected Tsunami's chamber to the emperor's quarters since Jurai. Now, after the advent of teleport stations, it remained one of few dramatically long passages left in the entire palace. Queens were oft more apt to appreciate and utilize its contemplative quality, thus for generations they had been the ones to kept it.  
  
Funaho didn't want to reconsider anything; she wanted to surprise her husband. She wasn't rushing past an even pace, and she didn't hold the scroll in her fist like a crumpled sword; it merely waved and flapped at her side, breaking the rhythm of her steps.  
  
Confident from the moment she opened the passage, she'd hoped to be even more assured at the other end. Everything remained constant till the door to Azusa's study.  
  
She wished she'd had the time to seek her sister queen's support, just as she knew she would.  
  
"Well isn't this a surprise." Funaho could see the emperor's smile even as he remained bent over his papers, likely remembering the romantic inspiration behind her last use of the passage.  
  
A dignified wife breathed away any hopeless emotional mixes and strode up to his desk.  
  
"Could you please explain this?" She spread her thin document over the others with a fresh coat of ice.  
  
Azusa merely read, then answered it with a new sheet of steel.  
  
"This is a royal order revoking Professor Washu Hakube's access to any and all patients at the fourth galactic sanitarium."  
  
Funaho slapped her husband with such force that she instinctively looked at her palm to see if his beard had cut. There was redness, followed by a slight throbbing that spilled fire down the tendons of her arm and into her chest. She'd never struck another person in all her life, but shock, guilt: both faded and were forgotten. In strong or better than stubborn silence, she waited for the repercussions of her heinous act, blinking once to stand like a tree but not like wood.  
  
Azusa did not rise from his chair or even lean back in it. He breathed a barely or overly forced calm to turn his head downward again. Funaho glared to make sure he was truly reexamining the document.  
  
"It seems it did not reach its intended destination."  
  
He held the paper up by its top edges. When he looked over at Funaho she remembered the last time she'd challenged his authority. This time the force behind her sought to shame rather than subdue.  
  
"Anyone who aids in the interception of a message sent by the emperor," Azusa began, "can be tried for treason."  
  
Back amid the suppressed shivers, the cries for surrender and pleas of forgiveness, something made its presence known in Funaho's self. It was the same thing that had strongly suggested she question her husband's decision, the one that had commanded she undercut his authority, and the one that now justified violence. She turned to him as if to bow, but remained starring down at a boy who was now ready to have his punishment explained.  
  
"There are Jurains here who would readily lay down their lives for me, even to defy their emperor."  
  
She watched the accusing stare drain from Azusa's eyes, leaving only restrained shock.  
  
"They stand ready for the consequences of their actions, just as I do. And though they are in no position to explain, I am," she narrowed her eyes, "if you are."  
  
"None of this should be necessary." The voice of the galaxy's most powerful emperor grew tired as he set the document down and pushed away from his desk. Funaho kept his shock warm for him as he continued, one hand massaging his eyes.  
  
"Ryoko attacked and destroyed a large portion of a Galaxy Police station. Although by some miracle no one was seriously injured, she showed every capacity for further destruction. This time we found no evidence that she was being controlled by any outside force. There was no other course of action available to me than to have her incarcerated in the best facility possible."  
  
He breathed, deciding if he'd wait for her to reply, and deciding against it.  
  
"And still you are driven to undermine me."  
  
"But, she's not-" Funaho began, without a sign of hearing his expressed confusion, and without half the strength she should have gathered.  
  
"Not what? Not 'well'? All the more reason to keep her where she can do no harm."  
  
"And what does that have to do with disallowing her visitors?!" Jagged anger found and dug its way into Funaho's voice.  
  
"You know as well as I do that there is a security risk every time we allow a visitor into one of those containment rooms."  
  
"But Washu ^designed^ those rooms! Washu ^designed^ Ryoko!"  
  
"So she has reminded me on numerous occasions, suggesting that I trust ^her^ to ensure the safety of the galaxy." Azusa kept calm for his wife's rising anger, but frowned at how quickly she seemed to forget how recently she'd forgotten herself.  
  
"She's her ^mother^ for Tsunami's sake!"  
  
"We should not even be having this conversation without the proper security scan."  
  
He looked down and placed his hand flat on the desk, pulling himself roughly forward.  
  
"Oh ^burn^ your precious security! Is that what all this is still about? Keeping the only members of a family apart just so you can keep this convenient conspiracy safe for another few centuries, just so you can further estrange our son and the rest of your children?!"  
  
Funaho's hysterics were finely focused, hardly pausing when Azusa exploded up from his chair.  
  
"Lady Funaho! Calm yourself this instant!"  
  
"I will do no such thing!" She bellowed back and leaned forward on her side on the desk.  
  
"This," Funaho pulled away to point at the document between them, the volume of her anger softened under its own weight "^this^ is the most despicable order I've ever seen you give. It's one thing to deceive your own children, but to tell a mother that she cannot be with her own child--- when that child may be-"  
  
She hated that she was crying, and she hated the idea of looking away from the emperor. In the end she could avoid neither, giving Azusa a prime opportunity.  
  
"Your emotions cloud your judgment again, my queen." He said it almost mockingly, snatching up the offending paper and sending a few others to the floor. "This order is meant to intervene before the same happens to Professor Hakube. There's no telling what disasters might result if she were to reject my authority as willingly as yourself."  
  
Funaho lost her edge in seconds, bitter tears pulling her face down to the side like a helpless surrender. Taken aback by this sudden apparent victory, Azusa frowned into himself before he retook his seat.  
  
"I am not worried about her spreading news of Ryoko's whereabouts; Galaxy Police Intelligence presents more of a threat." He closed his eyes and breathed, finding some small remaining patch of softness.  
  
"In regards to our son: I meant what I said. I do not envision his unrivaled fame lasting forever, in fact I am almost happy to see the early signs of its end."  
  
"You've spoken to her?" Funaho began, tentatively but tearless.  
  
"What? Spoken to who?" The heat began to rise in the emperor's face again.  
  
"To Washu, you've spoken with her about all this?"  
  
"I thought I made that clear." His gruffness came more reflexive than functional. Easily ignored.  
  
"What did she have to say about...all this, about Ryoko? What could have caused her to lash out like that?"  
  
"It makes no difference, from what I have seen she is little more than a stunted child. But with her power there can be no room for tantrums. Professor Hakube would do well to concede failure on this project and move on to the next."  
  
Azusa picked up the document and held it tightly enough to make it bow in his hand.  
  
"She probably had some falling out with that ridiculous schoolboy she seemed so attached to."  
  
"You mean your great grandson?" Funaho asked well above a whisper. She looked up and watched her husband's face begin to fold in on itself, when he showed no sign of responding she took a step forward with hands clasped across her chest.  
  
"Lord Azusa, do not deny Washu access to her daughter."  
  
Frustration was still a poor, then no cover for confusion as Azusa began to lower the paper back onto his desk.  
  
"I'm not asking you," she continued, "I'm begging you."  
  
Funaho's shoulders just passed the height of the desk as she went gracefully down on both knees and lowered her head to her husband. The mercy in her voice and the mercy it asked for spread into him, widening his eyes and even pulling his mouth agape.  
  
"Do it, not for the invaluable ally you would gain in so brilliant a scientist. Do it for your hopelessly emotional wives, who have all but surrendered their lives and children to your every whim and ambition. Do it for the woman who wishes to keep loving you, not as a feared tyrant, but as a merciful leader."  
  
Funaho raised her eyes without intent to melt pity from him, but with a final attack in a sincere surrender.  
  
"Please, do not make another mother go without her child."  
  
***  
  
Priest Charming rode his faithful stone stairs down from the sunset.  
  
Incense stick in hand, he slew the dragon that forgot its place as a good luck charm.  
  
It screamed like a colic baby and bled sweet smoke.  
  
Aged shrine patrons gathered around the body, showing off new toys and absorbent underclothes.  
  
Their bragging turned desperate, then violent.  
  
But He saved them. Like an arrogant God, He saved them with a hand gesture.  
  
He looked at his seventh and last earth wife through her wedding veil.  
  
She smiled doll beauty like a natural and kissed his cheek through the cloth.  
  
A serpent's tongue whispered in his ear that they were all insects on crumbling stones.  
  
Tsunami, as he'd originally envisioned her, stood giggling with Sasami.  
  
She faced the little princess, pulling out a nervously happy smile and a small blade.  
  
Sasami squealed and applauded with glee at the Seppuku performance.  
  
When it was over his youngest sister stripped away the old Goddess's robe.  
  
She twirled about in the blood soaked garment, laughing at how oversized it was.  
  
The wind for such an occasion. The obese and crippled dog.  
  
The world exterminated and replaced with koi ponds.  
  
He imitated a madness laugh just for the sake of curiosity.  
  
He imitated a madness laugh just for the sake of courtesy.  
  
As Ryoko dug the gem from her wrist and dropped it dry on the floor.  
  
As Washu floated behind her, adult in extravagant green, extending her hand over her daughters shoulder, letting the other two gems fall near the first.  
  
Ryoko phased into the earth. The gems blew into dust over stones.  
  
Washu looked him dead machine in the eye and tore out her hair, her scalp.  
  
She cracked open her skull like a crab leg and emptied the contents like a powder keg.  
  
He stood in fire, in stars, and outside the shrine office, looking impatiently at a wristwatch, waiting for something fancy to step out of oblivion with something clever and hideous to say.  
  
No sign. Yosho watched the mirror smear him with a wide excrement-starved grin.  
  
---  
  
Sweaty sheets almost glued Yosho down as he sat up and choked for air. The pungent moisture stung his eyes as he tried to re-orientate himself amid the slowly descending string of gasps. He pulled the sticky hair away from his face and held it firmly to his head, shaking despite the heat.  
  
All through the aftermath of Seita's ambition and eventual surrender, Yosho had expected and even waited for nightmares. But so far as he knew his sleep had been delayed but never interrupted. Even now this most recent string of visions was fading from memory, stealing away to be forgotten like the time since he'd last had such a dream. He looked out at the early sun and listened to the tranquility of tiny spring creatures.  
  
When the breaths finally calmed enough for him to swallow against his dry husk throat, when the sweat was wiped from his eyes with a dry corner of his sheets, he rose. A long drink of water prepared him to meditate for himself and to pray for his family.  
  
***  
  
Heavy, marching, not-gonna-take it steps carried him farther and farther away from the house. It was clean, no one was fighting, his work was done. There were things to do outside, and if they didn't present themselves immediately then he'd simply hunt them down. Maybe have them replaced.  
  
Tenchi had every intention of keeping his promise to 'Uncle', but there would be time after lunch, or after dinner, or maybe before breakfast tomorrow.  
  
*But she hasn't joined any of the family meals for two days.  
  
One more step toward the first extended root of the forest and Tenchi nearly doubled over. The gasp, the grunt, the grip at his belly, it worked no harder than any other pain but demanded more attention for it. He tried to take another step, just to steady himself, and the sensation increased like a choke chain attached to his home.  
  
This ailment, first triggered by memories of Ryoko's desertion, then moments of intimacy with Aeka, now seemed to discipline his movements as well as his thoughts. He shook his head at the ground and looked over his shoulder. Sure enough, the organ grinder turned a little slower as he took a step back toward the house. Of course, this just made confusion fill in for pain in keeping his face twisted.  
  
*I don't want to know.  
  
The bitterness of the thought struck brass, swelled his throat in the sun, and pinched his cheeks and jaw into a single gutter. With hands clenched to shakes, he burst into himself, into his mind like a gnarled orphanage nun, to scream at whoever was making all the noise.  
  
*Well I don't! I'm sick of wondering whose going to snap next, or who already has. I know that whatever's keeping Washu down there can't be good, and I bet it has something to do with her giving Ryoko a ship to abandon us with!  
  
Gasp grunt grip. So, the pain under his hand had nothing to do with how far he went from the house. He let his arms hang and it spread up from chest into neck and face. Although white-knuckle fists did their part to distract him, they hardly hid the strain of jamming curses under the sensitive part of his breath. There was nothing beaten or joined in the way he let himself fall in with his thoughts. No, it was definitely just a way to guilt them away by finally giving them the raging inner argument they wanted. His mind had asked for it.  
  
*That's right, she ^abandoned^ us! After all we've done, after all ^I've^ done to help her feel at home. What makes her think that she can just fly out on us when she starts losing her temper too much?! She wasn't the only one Seita tormented!  
  
*She---she---she just wants us to feel sorry for her! That's all! She thinks running away will make ^her^ the victim instead of us! Even I know running never works.  
  
Tenchi paused and widened his eyes, hypocrisy of thought burrowing like a torn grub. It took a while to reach his heart, long enough for the true experience to make itself known. The admission pushed out through his clenched teeth, the word 'betrayal'.  
  
*Just another night of drama, then she disappears---she must have known she wouldn't find him. But how could she be so selfish: make everyone care about you, then worry about you, then leave?  
  
*Well she can just stay and sulk wherever she is, her and Washu too. I've got a future, and I don't need crazy pirates or scientists making everyone else walk around on eggs through a minefield. Aeka loves me and I love her and it's taken me what seems like a lifetime to get to this point.  
  
Iron tasted even worse without a pinch of dust.  
  
*But---But I guess I won't be able to enjoy it till I just say:  
  
*'I hope you're happy Ryoko! You made it a lot easier to love Aeka now! So where ever you are stay there and stay out of my head! And tell your mom that if she misses you so bad she should just join you!'  
  
Tenchi, threw his fists out at his sides and scowled the sky black, ready to shout out the declarations he'd prepared. Then that pain, that weight; now he'd just have his knees. The ground wasn't much better than stone, though it invited the helpless and enraged rest of him to rest and cry a while. Not for all the money in the world---and for Ryoko?  
  
*I risked my life, everyone's life, just to save her once, and this-  
  
*What am I doing? I'll drive myself crazy. Ryoko's gone, and whether she abandoned us or tried to protect us, she's still gone.  
  
He looked up at the house and swallowed-in a sincere weakness. His heartbeat pushed cooling tar through brittle veins.  
  
*If I can't curse her out of my head---maybe Washu does know where she is, and I can get a real goodbye from her.  
  
Slow to his feet and unconcerned with the dust on his knees, Tenchi began walking back to the house, not as quickly as he'd left it, but certainly more determined.  
  
*If Washu doesn't know where she is, then I'll do my best and maybe we can help each other to---to let her go.  
  
The pain was fading, but not without flashing aftershocks. A hard blink and a tilted head and Tenchi was even walking a little faster.  
  
*And if it's not Ryoko that she's upset about then-  
  
Tenchi's pace evened out and the wind removed itself from his path. When he looked up he was almost warlike.  
  
*No. What else could it be?  
  
***  
  
Yosho had insisted on taking everyone out to lunch so that they could show him around the city. Tenchi and Washu were the only ones allowed the excuse of being busy. The back porch door had been left open to allow dust and bugs and maybe Tenchi and likely no one else to come and go as they pleased.  
  
"Hello?" Tenchi called almost as loud as someone expecting an echo.  
  
One hand on the handle, he pushed some leaves back outside with the side of his shoe. Still holding the door open, he bent and swept out the dirt from his shoe with his hand. He chided himself reflexively as he placed his shoes outside, forgetting to grumble at whoever had left the door open.  
  
Tiny dust hairs danced in the window like locust-faeries; Tenchi only thought of muted television snow. He walked through it to the living room, knowing then where everybody had gone the way he couldn't forget why he'd come.  
  
He wasn't trying to tempt one last distraction, or anything like that, but from the corner of his eye he spotted something on the middle ledge of the largest windowsill. It looked like a dust rag. A step closer and it looked like a stuffed animal. No, it looked like Ryo-ohki.  
  
The cabbit didn't greet him with her usual meow, but she also wasn't sleeping as Tenchi had assumed the last few times he'd seen her. He imagined Sasami asking if she could smuggle her little friend into the big city, then heard Aeka's soft direction.  
  
*'Just let her sleep Sasami.'  
  
But, standing over Ryo-ohki now, he was sure she wasn't sleeping, unless she'd taken to sleeping without her usual tiny snore and with her eyes half open. Though her body seemed relaxed, her position certainly didn't look comfortable. Long hind legs should be flat and supportive or sprawled out lazily to the side, not spread out behind her like a swimming or road frog. And even when those ears were flopped down they didn't look this much like unraveling rags.  
  
Tenchi felt his hairs find their end as he looked down at the patches of un-groomed fur, then the unblinking, dry and dimmed eyes. The weight returned with a few friends, and he began bending down before his knees could pull him faster.  
  
"Ryo-ohki?"  
  
The sound of Tenchi's own whisper killed any remaining delusion of a 'well-enough' cabbit. A numb lump gestated rapidly in his throat, feeding off the shadow denials, the dull repetitions that she wasn't dead. The muted shock of being too late readied itself to creep in, but he saw tiny lungs expand. Relieved for long enough to realize she wasn't responding, he reached out to pet a wild and likely dangerous dog.  
  
"Ryo-ohki, are you sleeping?"  
  
The cabbit closed her eyes mechanically. For a moment Tenchi thought she was trying to escape by better feigning unconsciousness, but the gesture turned out to be a very slow blink. She was looking right through him, had not heard him, and wasn't feeling his fingertips run between her ears.  
  
He swallowed, pitiful stuff buoyed under his neck, but he barely felt enough moisture in his own eyes to blink with. One last thing might get through to her, it wouldn't, and he knew that it would crush him back to helpless size, but he tried anyway.  
  
"I've got carrots, Ryo-ohki."  
  
She breathed mechanically. Tenchi forced his eyes closed, not sure now if he was fighting tears back or squeezing them out. They were still dry when he opened them to pick her up in limply quaking hands. He'd cradled more life in waterlogged beanbag toys.  
  
When they rose together he looked down and saw that the dust had settled over the cabbit, leaving an imprint on the windowsill. Like an inkblot, he tried hard to see an angel.  
  
Tenchi walked toward Washu's lab one step at a time. He looked back down at his package; a memory of how easily loved Ryo-ohki was led to a memory of Ryoko's joke about the ship's egg. It felt like a confrontation to consider how responsible he felt for the little creature, how responsible he was for its mistress. Again it became excruciating to put each thought in its proper place. Soon, he hoped, he and Washu---and Washu needed help, and Washu would help.  
  
The closet door stared back for long moments before Tenchi glanced again at the artificial little life in his arms, feeling how cold it was for lying in the sun, making sure he could feel its heartbeat. He adjusted to hold it in one hand so that he could knock. The door opened before he was ready, but slowly enough for him to step back. Washu crossed the threshold with arms folded and face beneath a shadow. Tenchi guessed that she had seen his feet first because she seemed surprised but not startled when she looked up. Her eyes were almost too drained to tell anything.  
  
*'Oh, hi Washu. I was just coming down to see you.'  
  
*'Hey Washu, we almost ran into each other there.'  
  
Normal, typical, basically natural responses. A few more begged weakly to be put to work, each like near-used-up school supplies at the very top of a trashcan. Tenchi barely considered the reflex of picking them out, but it took another few moments to feel it more appropriate, maybe even easier, to ask a question straight out.  
  
*'Where have you been, Little Washu.'  
  
*'What's wrong with Ryo-ohki, Little Washu.'  
  
But he knew the answer to the first one, and didn't know if he was ready to test his emerging theory on the second one. Washu now looked confused though, and gradually more frightened. He wondered how he looked to her, if it might be too soon for questions, if this might be the only chance he'd get for accusations. Apparently his own head got frustrated with all the options and let accidental honesty roll out the first composite.  
  
"Grandpa asked me to talk to you."  
  
Washu's eyes widened as her lip began to quiver slightly. She hugged the crab motif of her tattered bathrobe tighter and looked around either side of him. He considered telling her that everyone else was gone, but she lowered her head and answered for herself in a nervous hush.  
  
"I thought he'd taken everyone with him to the city."  
  
Too absorbed to even imagine how he'd convinced her of that, Tenchi focused instead on how Washu was disbelieving the small bundle almost balanced in one hand. He looked down as well, subtly extending his hands and weakening his voice.  
  
"There's something wrong with Ryo-ohki."  
  
Taking her invention from him like delicate explosives, Washu turned silently to the side. Tenchi watched her walk around him to the living room and felt his cells tense. Her slow movements were the last sands of an hour glass, the first steps of a doctor with bad news, but mostly the uncounted times he'd remembered those final shades of Ryoko's gold and pushed down a scream. And so for the second time he spoke without a head.  
  
"It's Ryoko, isn't it?"  
  
Washu froze, and though he knew he'd hit the target, pulled back the thick bandages for proper treatment, he couldn't move either. More memories, more than he knew there could be, they all had Ryoko's face and wanted to tear apart his mind piece by piece. Through the chaos of it he remembered what it felt like to lose control and remember Seita this way; the hatred that came wasn't as intense as this, but he wasn't even sure what emotion this was.  
  
"Tenchi," Washu laid Ryo-ohki down on the couch's headrest. One ear held up for a second, then flopped all the way down just like the other, cutting the scientist off from whatever control she had left.  
  
"My daughter, Tenchi-"  
  
He pulled his eyes away from the pitiful cabbit when she whirled around. In the few hurried steps she took to reach him, she readied the explosion. To Tenchi's second surprise, he was still standing when she collided with him, dumbfounded as she griped his shirt and pulled her forehead into it. Her wail wasn't supposed to be quieted by a sob, but it was, and froze Tenchi's blood just the same.  
  
"^She's losing her mind^!"  
  
It took some more of her sobs to think straight enough to search, then some more to find the right way to hold her. As much as he wanted to spill wisdom, as much as he eventually wanted to join her, he couldn't. He stood there, not beside himself or surreally present, just frozen in helpless surrender to this locust cloud of memories, just praying like a child to be saved from it.  
  
***  
  
Aeka sat next to Tenchi with bent face and folded hands, long silent. After arriving back with everyone else she'd tried to hide her suspicions: Tenchi's blatant announcement that Washu would stay in her lab another night, the way he distracted her while she tried again to convince her sister that Ryo-ohki just wasn't feeling well, both had made his request to speak with her foreboding rather than promising. Now everyone else was asleep or far enough away. She didn't have to try to hide her suspicions. Now she was successfully hiding everything.  
  
Tenchi had memorized the words he'd say to her, had said them, and was now repeating them to himself again, all the while waiting for a sign of life from his princess.  
  
*'Aeka, I did talk to Washu today. I'm sorry I lied but you're the only other person I want to know about this. She knows where Ryoko is, and she says that she's sick. She needs my help.'  
  
*'I'll act like I'm leaving for school tomorrow, but I'll actually be going with Washu in her other spare ship. That's all I know.'  
  
He hadn't slipped, hadn't even hesitated before the word 'sick' like he'd feared he would. But in context he thought Aeka might figure out the metaphor, might ask if 'she needs' meant Washu, or Ryoko. He was actually surprised at how calm he'd been. Of course, now the snap was more than ready.  
  
The enduring silence made room to curse himself for not working his love for the princess into the report. So what if it would have brought along implications that he 'still' loved her? It wasn't hard to tell her he loved her now, it was just hard to tell her the right way. As a matter of fact, he should break this agonizing silence and tell her right now. Well, what was he waiting for?  
  
Tenchi closed his eyes and kept them shut. He searched for a happy memory of Aeka that would not give him slightly less than an intense flashback of Ryoko. He was still searching when Aeka spoke.  
  
"How long will you be gone?"  
  
Her characteristically soft voice didn't quite grab him as much as it would have had it come from a mute, but it was in the same garden. Tenchi swung his eyes open toward her, almost asking her to repeat herself. He stopped soon enough to give her an answer, but not long enough to consider whether it should be so straightforward.  
  
"I don't know, maybe...I don't know."  
  
He saw her eyes travel upward into his, large and delicate enough to inspire an attempted salvation.  
  
"Washu didn't tell me." Tenchi was glad he didn't gulp, but didn't know if he was glad when Aeka looked back down at her hands. He certainly wasn't glad for the next stretch of silence.  
  
"I know you'll do what you think is right, Lord Tenchi."  
  
Her voice hadn't changed. Although Tenchi knew she was not speaking her mind entirely, he didn't look up, not even when he heard the couch move and felt her breath next to him. Only when she asked him to be careful with a kiss on the cheek did he flinch, and only after she was halfway up the stairs did he turn around to speak. He'd taken a breath and opened his mouth and everything, but that was all.  
  
***  
  
The next morning Tenchi turned around to see Aeka standing in the doorway, barely ten meters away. She'd already given him his goodbye hug in the kitchen, along with Sasami and Mihoshi, but there she was again, looking at a ship bound for war. In the steps it took for her to reach him it was obvious that she refused to run or cry. As she encircled his neck and pulled his face alongside hers, Tenchi didn't drop his book bag to hold her with both arms. He did hold her unreasonably tight with the free one. He tried listening equally close when she spoke into his ear.  
  
"I'll be here when you return, Tenchi."  
  
Aeka let him go and stepped back. He looked at her as she stood with head down and hands folded, waiting to receive reassurance or punishment. She was beautiful, she adored him, and in a slow blink he remembered every peaceful and romantic moment they'd shared together, uninterrupted by gold fevers or demon calls. It was an entirely new experience, and what she'd said to him; she'd meant to add 'I love you', so after he turned away he told himself to respond in kind to that.  
  
"I know."  
  
It was not until he heard the door close behind him that the tidal waves broke, carrying him to Washu's meeting place on strip of skin at a time.  
  
***  
  
The ship was little even for Washu and especially for the two of them. Though Tenchi's knees pressed into metal a few times, he knew he couldn't complain. Apparently the ship had to be almost entirely rebuilt simply to accommodate another person---outside its cargo port. He'd foolishly asked about any other ships and taken her no-response as deserved.  
  
That had been a very silent hour ago. The second half of it was initially spent enjoying an empty sea of stars, but the last quarter was wasted wishing for those big ugly planets to pass by again. Tenchi looked up at Washu's faint reflection in the windshield. Even beneath the shadow of her hair he recognized stone.  
  
*Did she get that robot double of hers to play chauffer.  
  
Tenchi leaned forward, wincing at the pain in his knees, and thought he saw the reflection stretch unassumingly, perhaps picking something out of its teeth.  
  
*No. Why would she do that?  
  
For the length of a vapor trail he considered a more troubling option, the kind he'd spent months of willpower to banish. It wormed its arguments deeper the more he closed his eyes to force it out. He told himself not to think about Washu's behavior, and definitely not to remind himself that he'd brought the sword. No. The only things he'd allow into his head were ways to preserve their spirits. Talking was the first and likely the easiest choice.  
  
"Washu?"  
  
"Yes, Tenchi?"  
  
He paused to hear her echo his short voice, then allowed himself to be nervous so long as he wasn't rude.  
  
"Will you tell me where we're going now?"  
  
Washu didn't allow herself to be either.  
  
"The Blue Rah Jin system."  
  
"Oh."  
  
Tenchi watched his reflection crinkle the opposite side of his mouth. Much as he wanted to cover up his blunt ignorance with sarcasm, it didn't look like it was in him.  
  
"Where is that, exactly?"  
  
"Just through this artificial worm hole."  
  
His legs cramped and his head thumped as he rose from his seat with a start. The pains were put on hold as he stared into the black tunnel swallowing them up with so many threads of blue light.  
  
When Tenchi had gone through one of these in Aeka's ship she'd turned off the viewing areas. The side reflection of Washu's face was eerily illuminated by the color racing around them, yet nothing changed in the external comfort of their travel. He looked around to every angle he could and gradually deflated his awe. A few blue lights slicing through a large black tunnel, certainly nothing to induce a dangerous seizure, hardly psychedelic, not even that long.  
  
Fair, silent stars again, and plain understanding in Washu's voice.  
  
"Don't worry Tenchi, we'll be there in just a few more hours."  
  
Sight-searching continued long after Tenchi realized he wouldn't be seeing anything. He'd have to pick up where he'd been interrupted, or better yet, where he'd misfired. That meant not thinking about Seita, which was a glad given, and it meant thinking about Ryoko, which was unavoidable regardless of anything.  
  
"When you told me what was going on, I asked what you wanted me to do without even thinking---but all you did was arrange this little outing."  
  
Washu allowed her silence to let him encourage himself.  
  
"You said that Ryoko was---was losing her mind. You-"  
  
Tenchi had to tell himself to breath, had to force the air in at knifepoint if need be. That was the cure-all, the only way to slow the thoughts and keep them clear at the same time. He hadn't heard the official diagnosis in his own voice yet, but it didn't take a second for him to start wishing for some shock, the kind that was supposed to numb you when something unimaginable was happening to a friend or more. The ship was too small to lose control in, so he'd have to keep talking, keep swallowing and crushing it all down with blessedly clean artificial air.  
  
"What do you expect me to do about it?"  
  
And he'd asked that in the wrong tone and the weight crushed him and the vacuum was better than this. Washu's silence eventually made Tenchi look over to make sure her face was still a stone in the glass. It was.  
  
"Washu?"  
  
"Whatever you can, Tenchi. Nothing more."  
  
Maybe she'd meant to add 'nothing less', but clearly she'd exhausted more encouragements than he had. This should have helped, or at least inspired.  
  
"But Washu, I'm not ^any^ kind of doctor."  
  
It hurt, Tenchi couldn't believe it could hurt this much to sound like a coward, and likely an emotional cretin. Soon as he worked that pill down he needed another to consider how the response must have actually struck.  
  
"I may have let on that she was in a hospital, or some kind of recovery clinic, but that is only true in a technical sense."  
  
Tenchi watched her head bow forward a little, assuring himself that robots couldn't show emotion, much less hide it like this.  
  
"The reality is that she's in a holding unit that I designed millennia ago. They're for holding beings with powers beyond the restrictions of basic matter. I can guarantee you that the only 'doctors' that have seen her, that will see her; they're singularly interested in chemical treatments-"  
  
Washu caught a sharp breath, but released it before it could cut its way out.  
  
"If anyone's going to design a medication for my daughter, it's going to be me."  
  
"Have you?" Tenchi asked after almost enough hesitation to end the matter.  
  
"I can't, Tenchi."  
  
Apparently she felt the disbelief welling up behind her.  
  
"The clearest answer I can give you is that I don't think I'll have access to her indefinitely. The real reason, though---I'm not sure I can explain it"  
  
Tenchi wanted to say that he understood. He thought he did anyway, as he barely had to think about it. Fooling around with Ryoko's chemistry was dangerous on any level, but no, it was more than that. He didn't know if he could explain it either, but it definitely had something to do with the weight, the one that still hadn't gone away.  
  
"I do have a theory, Tenchi, though I doubt you'll like it."  
  
"Go ahead." He welcomed her willingness to speak, even if he shared her doubt.  
  
"Her breakdown," Washu began with a crushed sigh, "started manifesting before she left. But I still thought some time alone would help, because it all seemed connected with Seita---and with you."  
  
"Me?!"  
  
Washu's pause lasted long enough for Tenchi to feel small for more than the crack in his voice.  
  
"I noticed this distinct emotional energy in her ^before^ Seita. It wasn't as intense, but it was definitely the same one that's consuming her now."  
  
When put so plainly it was hard to argue, even hard to question. Tenchi realized that he'd been resting his forehead against the back of Washu's seat only after the metal made a decent imprint.  
  
"I'm sorry, Tenchi."  
  
He took his hands away from the semi-permanent crease in his brow, sure that she couldn't be crying and sure that he still shouldn't much breathe.  
  
"I'm not trying to say that you 'drove' Ryoko to this. She crashed my ship, destroyed that GP hanger, and let herself be captured, all of her own accord."  
  
Washu gulped, then tilted her head as Tenchi made a similar sound.  
  
"Sorry if I'm adding that part in too abruptly. Don't worry, no one was killed."  
  
She waited for him to make another sound, even looked to where she figured he was watching her reflection.  
  
"What-" she swallowed thickly, "what I'm trying to say is that Ryoko isn't out for vengeance, or even attention; she means to surrender. That's the emotional energy I've been picking up from her, that's what's letting her consciousness shut down. She's giving up."  
  
Tenchi listened to Washu's sobs rattle against the cage bars of her breathing. He finally felt his throat loosen, the numbness setting another mercy in over his wailing memories.  
  
*Maybe its not numbness, maybe its just more pain I don't know how to respond to.  
  
Barely hearing himself over Ryoko's varied declarations, he spoke in monotone.  
  
"So what you want me to do is go and talk to her, get her to snap out of it."  
  
Barely able to think through the wastes of gold, he glanced over for Washu's response. Her reflection closed its eyes.  
  
"And you want me to do it because you think she values what I have to say more than anybody."  
  
He watched the path of Washu's tear, not waiting for her to respond this time.  
  
"Because you think-"  
  
"Tenchi, I---I don't claim to know anything about your heart, and I wouldn't intentionally come between what you and Aeka are making, and-"  
  
"Washu," Tenchi sternly reclaimed his moment away from fear; even he couldn't believe she'd attempt diplomacy after so much.  
  
"Don't you have a telepathic link with her?"  
  
"Yes, but that doesn't-"  
  
"I think she tried to form one with me."  
  
"She what?"  
  
"Washu, right now, the closer we get to this place, the harder it is for my mind to focus on anything else---and I think I might even be seeing some of her memories."  
  
Tenchi's monotone wavered slightly  
  
"And I know when something like this happened before---it was right before that fight with Dr. Clay---and Zero. I remember feeling, for just a second, like she'd called out right into my mind----a little while before Zero showed up. And then, before you merged Zero and Ryoko together, Zero, she was doing the same thing, calling into my mind, moving this awful weight on top of me."  
  
It was a simple tactic, take angry before you lose faith, and it seemed almost too simple for Washu.  
  
"Tenchi, when I merged them, I had hoped that Zero's components, the emotions it suddenly gained, would help my daughter. But-" Washu sucked in a sharp breath and bit down on "it looks like it may have been too much after all."  
  
"Washu," Tenchi began anew in the best sympathetic subject changer he could manage, "she didn't mean to desert us, did she?"  
  
"Desert you," Washu sniffed, "no, of course not."  
  
"She left, and she let herself get locked up so that she wouldn't hurt anybody. Then, I guess, when she gave up the idea of seeing anyone again--- she just gave up everything."  
  
"That's pretty much my theory." Washu almost sounded calm after another good throat flex.  
  
Tenchi breathed again, feeling his jaw quiver at new visions of how Ryoko might have changed.  
  
"She's not---^dangerous^, is she?"  
  
Washu was silent for much longer than he expected, then longer than he was comfortable with, but finally answered sincerely.  
  
"She still needs at least one gem to survive. She can make temporary ones over long periods of time, but at the moment she has the same one you gave back to her."  
  
"Alright---and she's in a cell she can't break out of?"  
  
"Well yes, but, you have to go inside it to speak to her."  
  
Tenchi's breaths were silent and Washu's follow-up was hushed.  
  
"Inside---there's nothing to move around for."  
  
---  
  
The hospital appeared in the distance, a collection of dull ivory boxes resting on a huge asteroid. Its iron glowed onyx near imbedded propulsion engines. Tenchi raised his eyes in time to see that it was nearly half the size of Earth's moon, but he didn't really look at it. All he could see was all he could feel: the protective numbness ready to split at the seams again. He hoped Washu wouldn't take his controlled tone for too much a shield or separation.  
  
"However she feels, however I feel, we've been through too much for me to forsake her now."  
  
Tenchi waited for Washu to respond, then let himself hope for her to respond well. Eventually they pulled into the dock and she spoke almost as calmly as he had, assuming correctly that they were assuring themselves more than each other.  
  
"We're here."  
  
***  
  
Tenchi looked around the dock for other ships. There was what looked like another one, shaped like a zeppelin, about a quarter mile away by the size of the people walking around it. Apart from that, everything was slightly more alive than the vacuum. He glanced over his shoulder at Washu's ship again, still unable to see inside.  
  
When she'd begun telling him where to go and how to use the access card, he'd thought it was just a formality. Quickly enough he realized she did not intend to go in with him. He might have actually assumed that the only thing holding her back was a one person per card rule, had she not admitted otherwise. The conversation kept his first steps toward the facility.  
  
*'Just hold that card up to the scanner on the right of the transport station, the one straight ahead. It will take you where you need to go. There will be guards in an observation room, just tell them Professor Hakube sent you, and show them the card. You'll have to walk to the cell at the very back, on the right, and hold the card up again to its connection tube. Try not to make any noise before you're inside.'  
  
*'I understand...guess these passes are pretty hard to get, huh?'  
  
The attempted joke had fallen so flat on Washu's face that he wondered if he'd broken some security rule by speaking of it.  
  
'If you make any progress I'll be able to tell from out here---I need some time to collect myself.'  
  
As Tenchi held up the card and stepped into the transporter he experienced a new anxiety, even though he'd anticipated every aspect of its rise. The notion that Washu needed to take a 'break' from seeing her own daughter drove his heart into the ground, but even as it bored into magma the moment of impact repeated. He knew she could see him in the transporter's lights, even from the football field between them. When his vision and atoms went blurry he tried to stand as straight as possible.  
  
***  
  
The guards had been ready for violence when they first saw him enter their work station, hands on their weapons, eyes boring into his. After displaying the card and giving the name, however, they'd looked ready to roll out the red carpet as soon as they found their biohazard suits. He'd held Jurian energy at the door they directed him to, and wondered if perhaps he should have requested a protective suit of his own.  
  
Within a moment of gaining access to what he imagined was the most secure facility in the galaxy, he felt appropriately insecure. The high amount of white for the absence of obvious light was unnerving in and of itself, but Washu had not spent much time preparing him for how nightmarish the actual holding units were. Every silent sway and undulation almost served to distract his fear rather than fester it, almost. Surely such an environment could not be helping her dilemma. It could be similar to Seita's dimension in there for all he knew.  
  
For all his past heroism he nearly stumbled to turn back toward the door.  
  
He could scarcely see its outline, and was at a loss to position the observation room those guards were watching him from, waiting for him to come back in pieces. Just to be safe, certainly not to simplify the bet they must have placed between themselves, he checked their intercom or whatever they had here.  
  
"Huh---Hello!"  
  
Hoping to have hollered enough to drown out that first gasped-stutter, and to be heard, Tenchi was soon glancing about in every direction for a camera or microphone or robotic arm to yank him out of this place if worse came to impossible.  
  
For some kind of reflex he held the card out, then high enough to see himself purely black and white under seamless lamination.  
  
*You don't have to go in there, Tenchi. You can turn back now, go home and start a new life with Aeka. Think about it, how much trouble has this pirate already caused you? Why let yourself get sucked into her---to her---  
  
Tenchi closed his eyes on warm tears. Even what might have passed for rationality, what might have preserved him so many times before, it carried as much weight now as a wet sheet of paper.  
  
But it was draped over his remaining courage; a pencil, held between his middle and ring finger, and this sheet might tear and plop to the ground.  
  
The memories were heavy machinery hammers, and her invisible cries for salvation were oozing from that bubble, that unnatural boil.  
  
Aeka's kiss was a shard of hot shrapnel, swallowed with soft fruit and imbedded in his throat. He clutched at it and may have felt each edge for he couldn't deny the wavering in his knees, the draining of his resolution. Within seconds he could believe in being petrified.  
  
The choice hadn't been made for him. The war for his heart was not over, but it would be soon, and the final battles would be even more horrific than he'd imagined. It curdled his stomach then but he was helpless; the passing stone of apathy, the one that had overwhelmed Ryoko's will. He hated himself for thinking it now, of all times, felt like slapping some strength into the child whining in his head. How could he ask blindly for deliverance to some easier position, to blamelessly abstain.  
  
He looked at the card again, his eyes red even in a colorless reflection. By the time he considered asking Tsunami for strength, he was already convinced that he didn't deserve it.  
  
Tenchi lifted the card closer to his face, the two thin black circles over an empty white surface fitting around his eyes like a mask. Emotional exhaustion was setting in, taking away his ability to sort through the two women screaming over the head of that frightened little boy. He saw Ryoko shivering with delusion in a corner and it made him bend sharply. On the way back to a moderate slouch he saw what Aeka had dreamed she'd do if left behind for the sake of a demon.  
  
Then he saw that face, twisted upward in the grotesque perfection of vanity- wielded madness. A god-ghost's eyes consume and create everything, then All in a long laugh, in a hiss of cruelty.  
  
It was a shower of ice water for the players in his mind, tearing bones out, erasing the memory of senses, and leaving him only a raw mind.  
  
His child had something to cry about now; some of those last words had made a place.  
  
*'---the woman who will love you---the woman who you will love.'  
  
The card weighted down his hand, then closed it tight. The bastard of Kagato and Death spread its bones over Tenchi's shoulder and drooled onto his neck.  
  
"HE-YA!"  
  
The sword was brilliant and ready to kill before he felt it in his hand.  
  
Five hard breaths and he focused his vision on nothing but more horrid cell-like prisons.  
  
*This---is ^not^ The Genius.  
  
This wasn't Seita, Tenchi told himself, even though it was using a voice he might favor, a practiced clarity from living between ancient conquest tomes since before their publication.  
  
*WHHHAT!  
  
Five identical putrid voices bubbled up from a single mouth, from a couple cells over. A different consciousness, but it also directed itself into his head.  
  
Seita never spoke this way...and nothing Washu could build could hold him.  
  
*Who would sneak in here after so long?  
  
The third voice was about as close, as directly positioned in his mind, but it sounded more like it might have a human shape.  
  
The sweat ran into his eyes, his mouth. And Tenchi began backing toward Ryoko's cell. He hadn't believed how important silence had been, but he didn't think of speaking.  
  
*^So^, a Jurian mutt has also come to see that ^measly^ ^menace^.  
  
The first voice sharpened its teeth against pestilent leather.  
  
*Has Hell finally split its chrysalis? Have yet the Old Ones come to claim their glory?!  
  
The second voice melted, and the slime fashioned crude organs in perversion's memory. Acutely aware of each other, the first two invaders in Tenchi mind synchronized their feast on his terror. It seemed their own excitement blinded them just enough to let him keep moving.  
  
*Is this ^boy^ a servant, come to claim all---who bear HIS touch, HIS mark?!  
  
*Do you know child, who's ^reek^ we were able to sense upon her?  
  
*And it was on her ^mother^, too. Indeed, how can you gain ^her^ access?  
  
Tenchi knew his sword might accidentally free these voices, loosing them to consume suns. He should put it away and silence his thoughts as soon as he finished fighting in this next breath. Seita's eyes made a kaleidoscope for every memory.  
  
*What's this?  
  
*...Ohhhhhhhhh  
  
*Of course. ^Your^ essence is tainted as well.  
  
*YESSS! The Ghost of Madness has-had-his waywithyou!  
  
*It has taken us some ^time^ to move our thoughts beyond these prisons, but your world-ravaging ^harlot^, even her ancient-genius-mother--- they will speak with us soon!  
  
*YESSS! They have drank of his venom, they may even know where his plague has blown him.  
  
Almost as fluidly as he'd unsheathed it, Tenchi put the sword away and turned with hands set together. He'd clear his thoughts before whatever they were scrapped them up.  
  
*Wha---thi---he---he can---^us^?  
  
*All---ee of you! You'll tell us where-  
  
*ENOUGH!  
  
No longer able to think clearly, Tenchi stopped trying to clear his thoughts, like he might drop a sword in the face of a tank.  
  
He couldn't sense the other two voices, but he instantly remembered the third.  
  
*Fool boy.  
  
Tenchi didn't know if he should consider responding to something with so familiar an energy.  
  
*They are older even than I, but on this plane their powers are--- vulgar.  
  
*Do not try to speak, you were at least conscious enough to know to clear your thoughts.  
  
Swallowing in the bravest way he could, Tenchi began walking toward his destination again.  
  
*The one they speak of, from what little they could force upon me--- he is impossible, do you hear?  
  
*They say they taught him much, and in return he made them bold.  
  
*Too bold.  
  
*Do you hear me...little Jurian?  
  
He passed the third voice, and was now closer to Ryoko. Yet still he felt the presence in his mind like the principles hand on his shoulder for some unknown reason.  
  
*Little---no, no it can't be! I was ^there^! I was too old for the position even then, but I was ^there^!  
  
Tenchi tried to use Ryoko as a beacon, this voice was not a friend.  
  
*Our savior! No! You do ^not^ go to see what you believe! Tsunami-- -he, She gave his life to ^save us^ from her!  
  
*FOOL BOY!  
  
In a grip about the neck that meant a strike in the face, Tenchi saw the war. The army, he recognized quickly, was Jurian. Its general had known great status, its general was old and terribly powerful. He began laying waste to the many-armed and other limbed adversaries, screaming 'heathen', screaming 'Tsunami's wrath', incinerating enemy and Jurian alike in a frenzy.  
  
*Do not try to defy ^me^! You---you Lie, you ^trick of blood^!  
  
And Tenchi walked faster, and fought harder to lock the intruder out.  
  
*He is not----She is not---give yourself to---  
  
It was that day, that beginning, the empty ship, the thoughts cleared before death. He had to block this madman out.  
  
*--nami---please---  
  
The card was still in his hand. Tenchi closed his eyes and tried to make his grandfather proud.  
  
*---its---don't---  
  
His own breath, again, and again out. The room had never changed, but it was quiet once more.  
  
The card nestled itself into the creases it'd left in his hand, not a feather of movement as the threads of light came to touch the gates, to bring him to judgment.  
  
***  
  
It had been nauseating and nothing like a tube, but once outside the little cabin the atmosphere felt pleasantly cool. An open field with a breeze from every impossible direction made its vibrating ground less than unsetting. But again Tenchi stopped to look for the light source when he recognized it as the same fuzzy gray lingering outside.  
  
Holding the card up to the final door between them, Tenchi held his breath like an amateur. Everything was absolutely muted now, but holding the card up again was no easier. Then and again he tilted back toward Tsunami's help but, whatever kept him reconsidering, it was more than the general's example. Where all the riches failed, the only gold in the universe eventually took him off his guard and lifted his hand.  
  
The sliding door was no more elegant than a supermarket's. The bed was hardly a cot, its sheets and pillows emerging from boxes at either end like tissues. There were multiple strands and tufts of hair lying about the floor. They did not look fresh, nor did the tiny bits of discolored mater. Dried saliva and other mostly clear fluids crusted the debris down in some places. In the left corner Tenchi could see feet, one rubber slipper halfway on. Knowing to look at her one piece at a time, he tried to see the 'living' space as just the way a messy person like Ryoko would leave it.  
  
It really should have created a malady of different smells, if not one overpowering overshadowing soap smell, but instead there only seemed to be a single stench. Organic as morning mouth film on tin teeth, it gently burned down his nostrils and around his throat. He was beginning his first look at her now, so he couldn't really tell if it made his eyes water.  
  
Emaciated twists of vein and bone stacked against each other; the bleached turquoise pants weren't made to fit anyone. Her shirt was long, its wrinkles old, and enough of it bunched up to show ribs stretching creamy yellow blotches across her skin. A sun-dried mantis arm dangled over one knee, having curled tight around it for too long. The way Ryoko's hair slopped over her head and face, a sky blue baby blanket left behind in a sewer rat's nest, it was hard to tell how the pieces on the floor had come loose.  
  
In seven steps around seven minutes Tenchi was standing directly over her, neither blocking the air nor casting a shadow.  
  
The first two steps had been wordless, though far from silent as he fought to breath or blink, to not bury his face in his hands. The third whispered out Ryoko's name, softer than the delicate footing that would have made her look up if she were awake. On his fourth her name was loud and clear and pitiful as a child holding up a once adorable road-victim for parental fix- all.  
  
A few progressively emotional words were well wasted on the way to the fifth.  
  
"Ryoko, it's me, Tenchi."  
  
"Ryoko, please, answer me. What are you doing here?"  
  
A quarter into this fifth step came the first stoop of Tenchi's posture, matching well the desperation pulling at his throat.  
  
"You don't have to do this, Ryoko. Whatever happened, we all forgive you. We all want you to come home."  
  
"^I^ want you to come home."  
  
Thinking it would help, halfway into the fifth step Tenchi worked some strength into his voice. It might have helped him and only him, and only a little.  
  
"Ryoko. I know everything that's happened, I know why you think you have to stay here, and you ^don't^. I can't just let you give up, not after all we've made it through."  
  
Tenchi's quick motion to wipe away his tears gave him time enough for the first wave speech to finish or spare him. Just before the next step, he fell back on an almost whiny but more than sincere voice.  
  
"I ^care^ about you, Ryoko. No matter what happens, I never want to see you locked away again. Please believe me."  
  
The sixth was silent as paralysis, and, for a step forward, it was almost better. Tenchi just let his eyes and jaw quiver. Ryoko hadn't changed her shallow breathing, just as she hadn't signaled that she heard anything at all. The shock of what was left of her bored deeper, a block of iron forced into the virgin sand, blunt end first. All the hesitation pains he'd felt with Aeka were like the first pebbles of an avalanche.  
  
Tenchi breathed her name again on the seventh, the lowest whisper for the final step equally ignored. So short a distance destroyed his knees, but it was unimportant, as Tenchi began speaking in a near moan for too many sobs at once.  
  
"Don't you understand? I can't leave you here like this."  
  
He timidly reached out to touch her shoulder, then pulled back. Ryoko's skin was icy and unresponsive a few centimeters away from actual contact.  
  
"Ryoko, I-"  
  
The next outreach moved even slower, pushing through a thick sea of visions. Tenchi's teeth clattered a few times, thinking on the strange warmth he felt at Ryoko's reckless embraces, stranger for how much more intense it was when they were invited, stranger still for how he always thought it to be discomfort. He reached her shoulder and held to it, lowering his head for tears that were going to be too large.  
  
Seita's guide through her dreams replayed itself, holding his blood hostage, that Ryoko could be happy so long as she could see him happy. But here she was blind.  
  
Tenchi's thoughts burst over themselves, drenching his blood back, all into his chest as he recalled that second time together with a demon in the cave. Her dawning surrender offered to him like more than a heart on silver; and all he could consider was his own possible escapes. Thus he forgot the needles in his joints and reached for Ryoko's other shoulder.  
  
"I'm sorry," his face and voice collapsed inward, "I'm sorry for everything."  
  
He pulled her limp form into him, feeling her hair tickle, then indent between her clammy forehead and his burning cheek.  
  
"Dammit Ryoko! Whatever I've done, whatever I've done to make you think-"  
  
And it was everything he'd done, every last thing he'd said or restricted, each possibility for shame washed in.  
  
*'Please hurry back, my Tenchi'.  
  
She let him go that day. Even if Ryo-ohki had been watching, she'd let him go.  
  
*And I'd hardly given her a glint of hope that it wouldn't leave her behind.  
  
*'Don't take anything from anyone'.  
  
The rave, pulsing music into adrenaline light, all the joy he felt dancing with her and simply watching her dance, its syringe pressed deep.  
  
*She---she thought I meant not to ^steal^. How could I be so blind?!  
  
*And then---and then I acted more concerned for how she might break something than for how scared she must have been.  
  
*That blindfold must have reminded her of-  
  
*'It was cold in there---and ^dark^'.  
  
*Oh gods.  
  
*'Nothing seems worth doing, but I still manage to do plenty of damage'.  
  
Tenchi held tighter and began rocking her into his sobs.  
  
"Please! Ryoko! It's Tenchi! Speak to me!"  
  
That was basically what it sounded like, ringing wet through his head.  
  
By emotion's immunity from explanation and bias for unyielding, Tenchi felt something like exhaustion and stopped thinking in terms of regret or sympathy. His plight, no longer about 'getting through' to Ryoko, became the sole drive; he had to be at her side, comfort her through every pain. He had to be a presence more than a hero.  
  
"Ryoko."  
  
He held her in one arm, faintly remembering Zero's last moments, though there was now half the confusion and twice the agony. With his free hand he smoothed and smeared back enough of Ryoko's hair to open her face to him.  
  
Another sob twisted his face, this one truly too large to escape. Ryoko's face looked dead, even with the breathing. The gold poured straight at him and the universe for nothing. Her lips hung open thinly, cracks of skin waved under her shallow breaths. Film turned to crust, pointing away from the corners of her mouth and into a few drained and dented wrinkles. Tenchi was closing his eyes again, ready to lean back into her, when life tore them open with a gasp.  
  
"^Ten---chi^."  
  
Clear and weak as would be expected from the mid-level above death, Ryoko had managed one word.  
  
"Ryoko! I'm here Ryoko, talk to me, please!"  
  
Tenchi smoothed some more of her hair back and gulped, realizing how close they were, that he was looking directly into her eyes and still missing the faintest glimmer of life. She remained silent long enough for him to convince himself he wasn't hallucinating, and that Ryoko was not gone yet. If this could be the only time he'd feel so focused, so undivided: so be it.  
  
So he acted. He reached through the weight in his chest, through the complete collection of dense memory, and struck at what he hoped to be both pieces of the same heart. That would have to be enough.  
  
"I'm here, Ryoko."  
  
Exhausted monotone vibrated in Tenchi's self as he clamped his eyes shut, relaxed them slightly, and moved. Sleeping princesses lied differently. A new bride would have been warm. A captured obsession could never hurt like this.  
  
And he pressed more of his life on, the scratchy peels of dried skin, the slick musk of hair, he'd breach the commitment seen only in dreams.  
  
Air came easily enough, eventually, no great struggle, and no profound reflex to gently wipe away more of his tears and her hair. She stared back at him unchanged and answered unaffected.  
  
"^Ten---chi^."  
  
"Yes, Ryoko. Its me." Tenchi replied to himself, his voice failing before the vision of a world still dead.  
  
She pronounced his name again, then again, then in slow repetition. It began to sound so much like a broken record that Tenchi waited for a needle scratch of silence, or preferably a sanitizing scream from anyone. For the first time Ryoko truly felt like a machine, a worn and worthless appliance, working with only enough action to beg its owner for the heap.  
  
The search continued, hardly more alive than her voice. Tenchi tried to picture his eyes becoming advanced microscopes to pinpoint a remaining glint of the real Ryoko. The chant wore him away like a sand pile amid the tide, leaving him to bury his face deeper into her hair. Silent cries jerked his body and made Ryoko's already pale flesh impossibly whiter beneath his desperate grasp. For a time that was his own, he'd randomly rock her and shake his head, creaking joints and sweeping hair into different tangles.  
  
Tenchi's world remained uncounted even when no longer followed by the mantra of his name. Silence and stillness before the tone-light of a card would take just more than seven minutes. The muted gauntlet tried with and without a prayer, and the watchmen let theirs be interrupted, but didn't lift an eye.  
  
***  
  
They made eye contact once, from across the docking port. Both of them mouthless as they cramped back together. Halfway through the Earth's atmosphere Tenchi did not open his eyes from the requisite blink. After so many times he still couldn't grind them like teeth, or weld them together. There should have been tears, at least some crack in his throat or face, but who was he to interrupt the dull hum of wind and distant jets outside the hidden flight dock.  
  
Inside it was small and hushed as a real secret, the ship's echoes were swallowed by the dark. Washu climbed down first, every step. Tenchi followed and moved just enough to pass her without seeming to try as a weight made him look slower than he actually was. Some steps away he stopped and half-turned back. Washu looked up but could not see his eyes, even though he wasn't slouched. He handed her the access card and began to leave again.  
  
"Tenchi."  
  
He stopped.  
  
"Thank you, I know you did all you could."  
  
Tenchi shifted his feet under the absent wind, while Washu's sleeves betrayed the subtlety of her movements.  
  
"I'm sorry Washu," Tenchi found something before emotion, "there was nothing I could do," then something after, "and---and I just can't think of anyone else who could help her now."  
  
Washu missed the unusual lack of pride in such a statement. She merely looked at the pure white access card, tracing her thumb around one of its thin black circles. Tenchi's next step away was stopped short. The adult scientist was too tired to be silent when she spoke to herself.  
  
"I can." 


	5. Verse Fourteen is Empathy Part 2

Standard Disclaimer:

I thank all the owners of the Tenchi characters who have chosen not to sue me for suggesting some alternative uses for them.

Standard Advertisement:

I thank all the readers who have perused my other submissions and favorite authors.

Standard Procedure:

In keeping conversations civil; substitute religion, and politics, for family.

Tenchi Muyo: Sanctuary and Asylum 

-Verse Fourteen is Empathy-

-Part 2-

She said---The Leper---sleeps tonight.

She said.

The greatest good---for the greatest number.

From the greatest evil---comes though they slumber.

The greatest triumph---proves the greatest blunder.

Greatness dies---but will still hunger.

-Excerpt "Blades". 

-Raymond Watts.

000

In a mid-stress sense reflex, Tenchi tested his hearing by closing his eyes tightly.

"Washu? What---what are you talking about?"

She wasn't going to answer till he turned, and perhaps not even till he opened his eyes. With such a hairstyle making it difficult to know if her head was level or limp, he began to wonder if anyone could afford to be cryptic anymore. If this was her way of saying she still believed in him it was an awfully sullen rally. Did she think he had anymore left for a second round, a tenth, never for too long, had to keep down suspicion.

But no. No. The days of keeping people in the dark had to be over. Now. For everyone.

It was almost a step forward, but felt more like a tightening fist. Maybe Washu had expected him to catch her meaning in only a few moments, and then keep walking till he could return with the next plain answer to an impossible choice. If he was relieved of his duties now, if she had a backup plan.....

**Grandpa?**

**Aeka?**

**Tsunami?**

Tenchi swallowed and knew it sounded louder than it was and hurt more than it could. If for only once in his life, he was sure that this wasn't pride in himself or doubt in others; these feelings for Ryoko were One bond. It was up to him to pull her back up by it.

Had been up to him.

He knew he'd still rather die than forsake her, even more true now than on that day. But that wouldn't mean anything this time.

And he wished, and maybe he'd pray that it could.

Washu took slow steps in what seemed on odd diagonal. Tenchi blinked over the few remaining dregs of his intuition, and might have stumbled were he not moving so slowly after her.

Rather than clearing her path, the lights flanked her by unveiling each piece of equipment she passed and little else. Most of them tub to car-sized and nearly all of them keeping some amount of fluid in another state of activity. Tenchi didn't give them any thought save how odd it was to land a ship so close to them. He remained focused on Washu till a contraption earned its spotlight directly in front of her, nothing like a game show prize.

Turning, the grown and normally beautiful scientist offered him stolen patience patched over worn anxiety. There was a promise of questionable consolation in a better look at the instrument she'd clearly been heading for. Behind her, it could as easily be a bed as it could a wing.

Still unwilling to jeopardize the lives of millions by communicating overtly, she stepped forward and further to the side, directing his attention away from her even less reassuring profile, and up the dense electric cubes supporting what turned out to be a bed after all.

More specifically, it looked like a jointed operating table, complete with restraints. Tenchi certainly didn't remember this being near the ship, but he did remember the last time he'd seen it.

There was no time to chide himself for not demanding a few guesses aside from the only person Washu could be referencing; he needed it all for the slow calcifying, the revelation of black anemia.

"_No._"

Before all eyes, Washu merely lowered her head to walk with purpose. Through the seals of memory, and back to the controls behind her machine, she gathered will adjusting the hum and dials, straightening its posture. Even a lost ghost could see this as a silent affirmative against a raging denial.

"_He..._"

She watched him accelerate through mire, collapsing earths coming to devour her unlit emerald moons. With barely enough care to navigate around the smaller consoles, he soon reached her shoulders, both hands unmerciful. Unflinching, she was bent back against the head of the table by Tenchi's slightly shorter figure.

"_You told us he was DEAD!_"

A moment for measuring breaths, and Washu's determination mirrored the intensity of his malice to the tooth. Her stare lasted long enough to measure for violence then, calm as a slow squeeze of anesthetic cream, she took his wrists and lowered them like frail antiques. Before his more frightened and no less enraged shell, she stood straight and came clean.

"I told you he was 'gone'."

Tenchi looked around the edges of Washu's face for something to break and somewhere to lie down, but only closed his hands, slowly crushing the preserved shape of her shoulders. Still unable to fathom apologies for ignoble behavior, he watched her, now stepping away, now through the holo-laptop between them, now only her back as she walked to the other side of the table.

"It took some borrowed power and some bent ethics, but I was able to transport him, unsuspected, to a hospital near Tokyo."

"S-So you'd wanted him to die _there_?" Tenchi's voice barely believed its own powers of denial, but Washu paid little notice or mercy.

"I wasn't entirely sure of his recovery," the spotlight above the table faded to a gentle bloom of floor lights, "and only moderately sure of his paperwork."

A path illuminated under Tenchi's feet and onward to a door behind him. It didn't compute that he might be blocking something when he dropped his rear to the floor with a thud, leaving his legs at uncomfortable angles. A moment's reflection on the air screaming out between his tight fingers, and Washu could tell she'd spoken too soon as plainly as she knew she had no time. She started on the path, and again didn't spare a blink when he roared up from the floor to tear the flame from her.

"WHAAAT!!!"

Bits of saliva shimmered through Washu's holographic keys, but she simply continued typing, waiting for Tenchi's next attempt to answer himself. His teeth were a crack away from making steam, but he crushed his eyes tight and speech slow to stave off an ending.

"You're---you're telling me---that _Seita_---is alive-" Tenchi swallowed the acid name with unforgivable difficulty "-that the funeral---was all just a _show_?!"

"Essentially."

"But---you said you 'even atomized the samples', why would you say that if-"

The empire of disgust began crumbling into squabbling bands of injury and confusion.

"Because all I had of him were samples. Yes, that was misleading, but I did everything I could to avoid direct dishonesty."

"_Washu_! In the n-name of-"

With a long, deep rake of his skull, Tenchi barely kept his feet.

"I'm sorry, Tenchi," Washu kept typing as she walked around him, "maybe I should have been a lawyer instead of a scientist."

There was no one to acknowledge her plastic humor over Tenchi's private series of mumbled half-starts. He hardly even noticed she was moving till he heard a door open behind him. Washu stood to the side of its plain glazed frame, waiting for him to enter first as she pressed the same button series in dull repetition.

Tenchi eventually charged a meager glare up at her, then retreated it into his hands with a shattered whisper.

"But how could you-"

"Let him live?" Washu filled in coldly, "Like I said, it's a---it's surprising that he even survived with such primitive treatment, the levels of exhaustion he was showing-"

She caught the returning angle of Tenchi's glare as it sharpened disgust. Moment by moment he poured over it, tightening his face to reach her throat. The emerald ice began to crack, in hairs, in chasms. Her lip considered a quiver as she awoke to the distance spreading between her and the most trusted, sacrificing ally. Eyes closed and reserves crumbled.

"Please, Tenchi, don't hate me for this."

When she looked again the glare had only worsened, not only sharp, but jagged now, carved by restrained quakes of Tenchi's own fall. And when she didn't turn away the glare began marching toward her, her and not the room she had directed him to.

Tenchi was going to strike. Not sense into her. Not the truth out of her. Looking at the computer and thinking of shields, looking back at Tenchi and thinking of weapons, blinking out a slow tear Washu let the laptop and every other defense dissipate.

The Would-be Prince of Jurai found himself looking down at a previously taller opponent.

Washu shivered, head down, arms withdrawn. Tenchi's moment of surprise regained its violence shortly, now working the same glare at a lower angle, not at an attempt to deflect, but at an anticipation to receive in full at less than a beggar's chance for mercy.

Neither hand raised nor breath fluttered, and Tenchi saw that Washu's tears escaped in the same curved lines as Zero's, as Ryoko's had. A ripple of weakness discolored Tenchi's face, quickly struck down.

"After all he did, after all he was ready to do," crushing one ring released a draining hoard of others, "you just _set him free_?!

Washu fought her eyes up into his, and slowly nodded them closed.

"And now.....Gods, NOW.....you think we can ask him for _help_?"

Tenchi shook his head slow to make his fists tight, let tears fall to raise the weapons high. The subspace doorframe sang under the force of his strike, Washu jerked under his now bent form. She listened to his muted sobs till she could dry her own.

"I know this is all wrong, Tenchi. You have every right to despise me, everyone does."

She swallowed fast and desperate.

"But I swear, I _swear_ this isn't how I intended anything."

The air needled through Tenchi's teeth and shivered the rest.

"Then why?"

"I---I've tried to tell myself so many---I tried to isolate it as some new kind of mercy, or sympathy, or pity, or anything. This was after days of telling myself that he deserved to be a helpless and alone in a strange world, that he deserved the pain of taking his _own_ life."

"But now," she scraped for resolution and found the dregs of acceptance, "now I don't think it even matters."

Tenchi pulled both hands through his hair, holding his face between his forearms, needing more energy to listen than he had to spare for processing.

"So what kept him alive," he breathed a bit more evenly, then back to pieces, "is he still---still connected to-"

His rage had crippled him, but Washu impossibly regained ground.

"He shouldn't be."

"But how can you be sure?" Tenchi slid down a little farther, his chest bending some of Washu's hair.

"My equipment could always be wrong, but it's the best we have."

"That---That doesn't _matter_! He almost killed you! He tried to kill my Grandfather. Sasami, he-"

Washu saw Tenchi's body rediscover its violence in a single terrible quiver.

"Are you really---do you think he could say something to---when he was out to see the whole universe end up just _like her_?!"

The doorframe sang higher this time, possibly drowning out a crack in itself or Tenchi's bones.

Having managed to raise her eyes a few blinks under the bulk of Tenchi's despair, Washu offered her face back to the shadows.

"He may not have to say much."

A pitifully loose chuckle infected Tenchi's next burst of sobs.

"Heh. Will she just see him and remember vengeance? Will she just climb rage back to reality? Is his 'mere presence' going to be enough?"

The laughter choked on the soft bellies of his distended sobs. Washu was almost hushed.

"Possibly---in a manner of speaking."

After smearing his face downward with a slow and steady palm, Tenchi coughed up another joyless laugh, dropping his exhausted words inside it, holding nothing out for a positive answer.

"Do you even know where he is?"

Washu looked long into his face, reaching a tender hand halfway toward him. Tenchi didn't notice how she closed it, withdrew it, used the fist to push down the next assault of fear. Speaking only after her back was turned, she led him into the next room with all the focus she could counterfeit.

"Close enough."

000

There was no luster from the technology that had brought him back from another galaxy by midday, and now no tarnish on that which didn't reach his destination till late afternoon. The dull campus was uninviting, very level and very skewed rectangles amid the long shadows. Built decades ago, amid foresight's desperate craving for open spaces, concrete became yellow or gray where it should have been white, windows were frosted with sepia tiles to guard against distraction more than the sun's glare. At least there was air and trees that filled and overfilled their enclosures.

Buildings were scattered rather than piled, and in no readily apparent order. After half an hour of looking for the map that should have greeted him at the parking lot, Tenchi realized the land didn't naturally slope in any one direction for long. Passing what looked like an office rather than a class, he recalled how he'd never given public education much thought, save to scare in a few more hours of study time. There was someone inside, but surely they couldn't be bothered to give direction. In the few faces that he accidentally looked into he found either self-conscious contentment or boredom, likely for the deceptive boy to woman ratio as much as anything. He also remembered that he usually memorized his own necessary path at school, and little else.

Washu had her own three-dimensional map of every structure in the eastern hemisphere, and had pinpointed the specific genetic focus to a room on the 'eastern' section of the campus. Tenchi had her equivalent of a cell phone, so as not to confuse or draw attention. A last resort, but not far from thought as he tried to construct the logical order of door numbers through the encroaching memories of very different eyes on a single person.

Doubling back, he noticed a hallway he'd passed by. There were furnaces of pottery and blown glass at the very end of it. Someone struck steel and someone laughed with more enthusiasm than necessary. The corridor itself was dimly lit, even though it was papered with overflowing bulletin boards.

Tenchi took a strengthening breath, which in little time turned deep, then excited, then Tenchi had turned his back on the hall and shuffled toward a bench, reaching for it early like a rickety old man.

Paint flaked away beneath his fingers as he told himself that he didn't care if anyone was staring. He told everything to leave him be, all but clutching his head to spite the balance he still hadn't regained.

**What am I doing.....**

**Is Washu insane? No, I'm not insane.**

**I can still stop this, end this right now.**

Tenchi griped the bench with both hands then spared one to crawl toward the weight at his side.

**What are you going to do, Tenchi? Dash in there and spill his blood all over the classroom?**

His imagination surprised him with its vividness, even more the sharp grin that snarled up for just a moment.

**Don't. **

**I don't even know if he's still there, his class might have ended already in the time it's taken me to look for it.**

An odd sound snapped Tenchi's head upward and to every side. In a few, thankfully lonely moments, he realized that the bench was rocking under his grip.

**That's it! I'll call Washu and tell her the whole thing's off!**

"This is---this is impossible," Tenchi breathed wet sand as he dialed. He didn't even bother composing himself, just trembled in silence through the first ring, injecting his vision with a return to Ryoko's side. This time he would hold her even closer to him, this time he would bring her home and heal her soul himse-

The line picked up and Tenchi's jaw cut backwards to clamp the last memory vein, Ryoko's vacancy heavy with plea. The call had reached through and Tenchi was ready.

"Hello, Misaki Residence."

"Where is he?"

Tenchi's voice could have shouted and not conveyed so much determined fury.

"Hello? Tenchi.....is that you?"

Aeka was clearly too confused to be offended.

It should have been drier for being so cold; Tenchi nearly dropped the phone to loosen this other hand on his throat. That he'd asked precisely the wrong question to precisely the wrong person became unreal for the absolute absence of any potential for irony. The relief of hearing Washu's voice in the background rose only as a shade.

"Issat-Tench-es-I-believe-ould-please"

"Hello, Tenchi." Washu was stern, disappointed that he'd chosen to call rather than apologetic that Aeka had answered.

"Tenchi?" She considered worry distantly.

"Washu." A part of him hoped she felt whatever it was he'd swallowed.

"Tenchi, I've pinpointed your relative positions."

"Washu, I-"

**I can't do this! I won't do this!**

"Turn around and walk into that little open hallway, there's two big classrooms on the left. H---It'll be in the second one."

Stated plainly enough, the confirmation made the world quiver. Tenchi felt a year younger and more vulnerable by the second, mature revenge sank as tears welled up.

"C-Couldn't-"

"What's that?"

"Can't-"

"Speak clearly, Tenchi."

He swelled himself with the hardest expression he could manage, then felt it burst and ooze down his neck.

"Wouldn't it be easier to have him meet us somewhere?"

Tenchi could feel that she saw him, eyes clenched and jaw trembling. He knew that she'd heard him clearly, so after the fifth moment of silence he began wondering why she was taking a seventh. There was a sound like a sliding glass door, and he knew, and he hoped that Washu had stepped away from Aeka's earshot in a way to make it look like she needed better reception rather than privacy.

"Perhaps I was wrong to assume you understood," Washu began towards solemn.

"No, listen, maybe we don't-" Tenchi began, interrupted but knowing he sounded too much like a child to protest.

"Tenchi, you do realize that I've had absolutely no contact with him since....."

"Yeah. So he doesn't realize I'm coming for him, that doesn't mean-"

That he could have overlooked the importance of surprise, even in this context.....Tenchi inwardly gave himself one of his grandfather's disciplining strikes, then another, halfway into another when Washu spoke again.

"That may be a bad choice of words, Tenchi. In all honesty my guess is not much better than yours as to how he'll react when he sees you."

Tenchi felt himself begin to resent the scientist anew.

"Washu."

But his voice could still only convey fear.

"Hey may even try to run." Washu hesitated long enough for that and the other unspoken, harsher possibility to sink in; Tenchi had the sword, but neither was sure if he'd need more and be able to get it fast enough for who knew what.

"If he doesn't come willingly-"

"I understand."

"No, Tenchi. I don't think you do. Don't speak to him anymore than necessary, I'll handle the negotiations from there. If we have to, we'll do it another way."

"This is too much."

He hadn't meant for her to hear, but didn't have whatever it took to regret saying it. The silence passed between their wants in its own time.

"You're my friend, Tenchi."

It would have sounded sincere enough even separated from silence. And she hadn't said 'I believe in you' or any such dismissible cliché, thus it struck him tenfold and left him stunned through the rest.

"Probably more than a friend. Apart from Ryoko, you're the closest thing I've had to family in thousands of years. And I mean it, the same way I mean this possibility. I know it's all entirely insane, I know, but I wouldn't ask, I wouldn't put you in danger, if I had a fraction less of faith."

One piece of steal banished another.

Forced to breathe more evenly by the shock, Tenchi made himself glance over his shoulder. The student smiths were cleaning up; classes would be letting out soon.

"Are you sure there isn't-" Forced calm was better than none, he felt, even as he failed to complete his thought.

"I promise you, on my word. That if there isn't a real hope of having his---that is, I promise that you and I will take the most hands-on approach we can, even if it means blowing that prison to dust."

Tenchi began to turn, his shoes twisting a cigarette butt and sending dried yet unburned life into the wind.

He reached the mouth of the hallway with casual, then dead steps.

"Washu---keep talking to me till I'm there, okay."

He could hear her breathe, maybe cry on the other end.

"Okay."

Estimating with a glance at his watch, Tenchi had probably five minutes and fifty steps to go.

"I'm-"

"Not far now."

He'd meant to apologize, and it seemed she'd suspected this too.

"You have nothing to be doubtful of, Tenchi. This is the bravest thing I've ever seen---ever known---and I---I can't say how grateful I-"

To hear Washu being both so sincere and so vulnerable somehow strengthened him a little before draining twice as much away as he stepped into the corridor. Only the farthest of the three hall lights flickered. The outdoor furnaces were under thick but moderately translucent canvas ceilings, and the classes themselves had the last sickly hour of skylight life waning under the doors.

A few of the bulletins had blown to the floor; a smaller breeze pulled off another and enlivened the rest.

"Washu," Tenchi recognized his fear and tried to banish it before continuing, "is there anything else you haven't told me."

No immediate answer.

"I only set the phone down to dry my hands, I'm sorry, I never-"

"That's-" it was difficult, but not impossible to force down any related thoughts for a better time. "That's okay, Washu. I probably would have goofed up anything more advanced than a cell phone."

Tenchi heard her muffled laugh, and he tried to echo it as he moved on. He found himself attempting stealth against the left wall, later realizing that anyone coming out of the first door would see him in one of two moments. It was a bit late to seem less suspicious.

"What I meant to ask, what I mean---what I meant to ask was, is there anything else, anything you haven't told me?"

He knew she'd recognize how difficult the question was, how open it made them both, and he slowed his pace to give her time even if all strategy warned against it.

"I don't think so." Washu responded like the image of a shaking head that was obviously still checking possibilities.

Another few steps, no longer pressed as flat against the wall.

"There is one thing."

It took almost everything Tenchi had already used to keep moving to such a rise in her self-consciousness. Managing to sound composed helped some.

"Go ahead."

"He---Seita. This is probably unimportant, but do you remember that night when he introduced---when he explained his powers to us?"

"Basically, yeah"

"Do you remember how he compared his powers to Ryoko's? How they're both fused with the DNA of the 'mass' creature?"

"Go---go on."

Washu's first and second breaths were expected enough, but the fourth finally made Tenchi stop his approach.

"He explained that when a mass duplicates itself, it's really just a 'perception projection', a mirage. This is basically correct, the difference is, and for whatever reason I chose to correct him at---a later time-"

"Yes, and?" Tenchi tried to sound encouraging rather than impatient.

"With masses and with Ryoko, they can, and often do---'put some of themselves into it', so to speak."

"Meaning?" Tenchi's confinement to repeated questions almost made him whisper.

"What I mean is that, if Ryoko wanted, a double she made could perform a simple task, like pour her a glass of sake, or lightly strike an enemy a few times. In this case, she'd be putting some of her own energy into it, you wouldn't be seeing a double where there was only air, you'd be seeing a double where there was a concentrated sphere of her power."

Tenchi stopped and flattened against the wall entirely, locking his knees as a precaution.

"You mean all this time Seita's illusions could have-"

The disbelief poured out in a frigid stream till Washu diverted it.

"No. In all the places where it might have.....'suited' him to do so, there was no evidence. I'm fairly certain that the result of his specific genetic experience is that he simply _can't_, even as the other aspects of him strengthen."

"Washu---why in the world didn't you-"

"I know. I know. But this information didn't reach above hypothesis until those last days."

He heard someone approaching behind him and quickly made his way to the five amazing job opportunities and three, one expired, concert flyers. Sure that whoever it was couldn't see his face, he waited, then remembered the phone and the more imminent uncertainty.

"What does that mean?"

It then dawned on him that he'd heard high heels. This relieved him long enough for the person-specific paranoia to creep closer. Washu's own slightly anxious voice helped him banish it with excessive force.

"I told you, all I have are theories."

They gave each other a moment for ears, then another for air.

"Almost every day since I made the announcement, I've thought about it."

"And what do you think now?"

She ignored his incredulity and, without warning, grew a chill shroud.

"When a mass dissipates an illusion with some of itself inside, that energy is dissipated too, yet the particles automatically gravitate back toward their source, leaving only a few behind. If Seita actually did put any of his own life into his illusions, once they died---they never returned to him."

Tenchi listened, then, uncertain how this information had impacted him, he stepped away from the wall and took the first of the last six steps. He was ready to wish her a quick and stoic farewell when she continued, and he could feel her eyes, grasping soft, asking deep.

"I'm still wondering, especially now," she almost laughed, "what it must be like to put none of yourself into your creations---or, what it is to give something life, knowing it has no purpose, other than to perform, and then vanish."

A clamoring shuffle. The students would be flooding into the hall soon, too soon. Tenchi gasped a hurried goodbye and felt so trapped he tried to streamline, pull all his organs closer. He realized then that he'd just crept over the first door, that its doorstop and the second's were against the wall, between his feet, two inches from each other.

Two gossip-giddy girls, and one joyless emaciate youth swung the first door open, almost nudging him with the handle. The second door moved more slowly, and Tenchi shot a panicked glance into the stick-thin window between the door hinges. The three students were not him, probably far too average for him to wear, even in desperation. But he couldn't waste energy on that, now he had to decide if he'd chosen the absolute best or the absolute worst position.

He couldn't watch one door with the other ready to pin him to the wall, and looking at the bulletin board again would just obstruct traffic. If he dug in, maybe grabbed hold of one of the doors, but that would draw attention. At least there was some chance this way that his target would actually pass him and he'd be able to follow to a less public place, but he was a swordsman not a spy.

More students from both sides and it wasn't long before he had to catch and hold the first door open. With the other hand he redialed equations on his slightly odder than normal cell phone, watching everyone's average shoulder height, waiting to see someone's torso. One student from the first class headed toward the furnaces, but missed his chance to tip the doorman.

The second class, Washu was right about its size, must have noticed him about as much as the fallen bulletins. Ten minutes later he'd counted twenty more harpies, a handful of ghouls, but no ghost. There were a few papers still being shuffled inside, probably.

Tenchi considered stealing a glance and carefully let the first door close, grimacing down at the glisten of sweat on its handle. When the latch snapped he breathed and lowered the phone into his pocket, careful not to let it switch off. He stepped away from the wall and focused on precisely how much time it would take to have the sword ready. Feet drawn silently together, he stepped forward, nearly planting his nose into someone's chest.

000

"Is Tenchi going to be home in time for dinner?"

Aeka kept her eyes on the greens.

"Sis?"

"Mm, sorry Sasami. I, that is, Washu said that Tenchi was running an errand for her. I only spoke to him for a moment."

"That's odd."

"W-Why, we do not have to have a deep conversation every time we-"

Sasami giggled brightly, and both Aeka and Mihoshi looked up from their dinner tasks to stare in wonderment, almost forgetting that they still didn't know the punch line.

"Dear sister," Aeka put on a pretense of annoyance, "what ever is so funny?"

"I wasn't talking about whatever you said to Tenchi, I was just saying that it's odd that Washu wants him to do errands. I thought she never asked for anything from the city."

Aeka looked puzzled for a second, then blinked slowly, shaking her head so minutely that no one seemed to notice.

"That may be. But, you know, she might have done so while you were away."

"Oh." Sasami's spirits visually sank, and she returned to the last of the preparations.

"Actually, miss Aeka, I think Sasami's right. I don't remember Washu ever adding something to the shopping list. She must have almost everything she needs down in her lab."

Aeka curled her lips to the side slightly, then less slightly, as if she were restraining herself from questioning the detective's memory, or the value of the GP.

"Ah. Well, in any case there's a first time for everything."

There was a renewed and almost redoubled cheer in the First Princess's voice as she moved toward the sink to continue her task, humming up a bright and directionless tune.

000

**She needs us.**

**Sister, it is.....difficult to know your meaning. **

**Even when she embodied chaos in the highest, she never engaged in such reckless folly.**

**Both our memories are vast, but they are both still selective.**

**She has no idea yet what she is---**

**It is better that way.**

**Just because she hardly heeded our advice before, it does not excuse us passivity. **

**Is your greatest fear really that you be accused of inaction?**

**Our inaction will have far greater consequence than reputation.**

**Our continuing to speak is still quite a scandal.**

**.....**

**.....**

**How close a look have you taken, since his---reversion? What do his eyes tell you when he gazes upon his plain place on that plain world?**

**I'd think that he's seen enough, of worlds and more, not to dismiss any as 'plain'. **

**I said---how close did you look?**

**.....**

**.....**

**Close enough.**

000

There were hands on his shoulders before Tenchi could even reach toward his belt, large hands. In fact, in another moment, he realized that all of this taller man was fairly large, and after a confused yet still overly cautious glance upward, he realized that this was a chance encounter with one of academia's most oddly common social phenomenon: the jock science professor.

"Whoa there, little buddy."

"E-Excuse me." Tenchi's voice was soft but clung to dignity throughout the short bow.

It occurred to him then, as he kept his eyes darting about, that he wasn't blushing a sweat over an oversized smile while scratching uncomfortable chuckles from out the back of his neck. He was entirely too tense for anything of the sort.

"Can I help you with somethin? You look kinda lost."

"I'm," Tenchi realized he was now behaving like a nervous delinquent, and promptly adjusted his posture with a forced casual breath, "I'm, uh, I've never been to this campus before, but I think a---someone might still be in your class, someone I'm looking for."

He winced at his nervous voice, then hoped that he'd at least sound too much a fool to be suspicious.

"Oh well, uh, there's only about three students still laggin' in there. What's their name?"

"It's-"

Panic tasted unspeakable in its pure form. Plunging his hands into his pockets, leaning back and staring down and around into the classroom probably pushed him back closer to hooligan status, but it kept him from spilling anything there in the hallway.

"He's.....taller, maybe about as tall as you, or maybe more. But thinner, I mean, he's kinda thin and-"

Tenchi froze in place, shoulders still drawn close in the universal 'skinny' body language. Feeling ridiculous, knowing that he was answering an entirely different question, he then realized that, after months in the city, the former guest might look like anything.

"I guess he.....looks like a foreigner."

He felt the life drain from his voice. Half expecting a shout from the professor for him to speak up, he continued, losing himself in how to describe memories he'd both murdered and fossilized.

".....Blue eyes."

"Heh, yeah, I think I know who you're talkin about. I'll go tell him you're waiting."

The professor had obviously been only half attentive, and yet the next moment Tenchi was struck with how monstrously vacant he'd just been.

The element of surprise, had it ever existed, was going to die any second now.

Having just finished a lecture, the professor retained just enough projection. Tenchi listened, letting the rest of his nerve, and most of his senses slip to the floor. Two book heavy comrades leaving the room knew instinctively to treat him like a rudely placed pillar. He hardly noticed when one of their backpacks grazed his arm, and though he felt like he should be slouching, mouth slightly agape, he knew he didn't have the flexibility. The first information to register made him smirk in irony, and from that he tried to rebuild his confidence, grasping for materials in a slow fire.

"Hey, uh.....excuse me."

Like a dried switch, snapping off at the tip, Tenchi tightened his fists and strained his ears. But if the remaining student had answered, he was still too soft-spoken.

"-ere's some guy---side---for you."

Even having lowered his voice to one on one, the basics of the conversation were still clear, but the other party continued, Tenchi was fairly certain, with mostly physical prompts.

"Some guy, haven't seen him before."

One of them was shuffling papers and bindings.

"Aw, I guess he was average-looking---one of those silly---hair things."

Tenchi didn't think of sunglasses, or heavy fedoras and trench coats, but he did imagine that, were he to kill Seita right there in that classroom, the professor would probably be able to provide a more specific description. He searched for another ironic grin in this, and failed, and considered running as fast as he could.

Silence, the snap of a satchel, and there were heavy footsteps coming right for him. It was clearly a long gait, somebody skipping stairs without losing balance or purpose. Tenchi hardly had time to plan a stance. His fingertips touched the sword, and the coach's diplomatic duties were over. He shot a friendly grin as he jogged by.

Tenchi could still hear the heavy steps out onto the campus more than any sign of life from the classroom. He considered stepping away from the door.

**Stare-down in a hallway, or walk into that class right now. There could be another class in here any minute.**

**Yes, and this could all still be the worst idea in-**

Seita was probably wearing tennis shoes.

**Ohhh....._gods_.....**

His steps were slow, obviously deliberate or paced to seem natural.

**Tsunami.....Mother.....**

Tenchi took a step back, a defense, a retreat, he cursed himself for it regardless.

The steps did not ascend any slower. There couldn't be more than ten, twenty seconds before the hallway was theirs.

**I'll match him.**

And Tenchi moved back another, more softly this time, uncertain why this plan seemed the best possible.

**Every time he takes a step up I'll take one back.**

It wasn't terribly difficult, so long as the former guest had not been blessed with above average hearing before witnessing oblivion.

**So far so good.**

A shadow touched the doorway's ground, would have filled it were it thicker. The approach stretched then drowned it in the less light of the hall. Whatever remained of readiness might well have begged for one more hesitation: Linger in the doorway, please. Yet the shadow lost in the hall crawled back, up, and under, remaining for two long steps before better light melted it away, revealing the villain.

Tenchi had been right about the tennis shoes, but wasn't sure how to take in the rest. The almost olive-black slacks might have looked sharp on someone before their widow donated them. With buttons and a collar, the short sleeves barely excused the shirt for not being tucked in, hanging single blue, old or new faded blue, hospital blue. Slightly oversized as it was, the top button held beneath his stubble neck, the eight o'clock shadow spreading up and all but matching his shaven head.

One hand pulled the second strap of his book bag over his other shoulder.

No sign of makeup.

Tenchi hardly noticed anything save this wait for eye contact, feeling no stronger for having it ready all through the long entrance.

Seita decided he needed to take one more step, lifting his head with atrophied grace.

"Hello, Tenchi."

It was the 'plain' voice again, but matched with the almost every-man movements, it made him seem as old as dad, if not older.

The eyes. The same.

Weary of needing sleep, but vividly alive, in a place less accustomed to shrugging off the 'different' as 'foreign' anyone might have noticed that there were separate kinds of 'odd'.

And the comparison to Ryoko should have been expected, and the memory, and the rage afterward too.

Tenchi almost winced when he realized he was gripping the sword in his pocket. The same energy maintaining his focus was preventing him from venting any of the pain brought by flashes of his fallen half.

She had been foul and frail in his hands, and here was a monster who had wielded madness.

She had been unreachable, like painted candlelight stained by smoke, and here was the being that had served as Oblivion's archangel.

She was sewn to every emotion in him, though all but dead.

This was the cause and possible cure, this thing of unspeakable ambition and unfathomable memory.

"Would it be vulgar of me to assume you'd come here, now," Seita blinked to lower his eyes with the same failed grace, "to 'finish the job'?"

Just the dust of a croon now, a velvet test-strip hardly long enough to ring a baby finger, but it was enough to make Tenchi pull out the sword, slow, almost subdued, holding it plainly at his side, saying he was ready though he wasn't, that he would use it though he couldn't.

"I....."

Tenchi couldn't believe he'd begun to speak before having the slightest idea of how to reply, and was quickly thankful that no one could see his face till he could pull it back, high enough that no one would think he was hiding and few would consider looking too close.

"Washu told me you were here."

It felt something like 'good enough', worked for both opening communication and keeping it to a minimum.

**He's coming closer.**

"I see."

**No. Not this again.....talking as he approaches me.**

**Not this again! Oh damn it to Hell I swear I'll do it! Doesn't he see? He comes close enough I'll do it right here and never show my face again.**

**Why? Why won't he look up at me?! **

"Whatever else she's told you---"

Seita had kept his hands on the backpack straps, but folded his arms now, shifting them as he slowed his final step, barely within range of the sword, looking far more nervous than intimidating even before he raised his eyes.

"What do _you_ think you'll tell me?"

The larger, though clearly no more composed figure might have spent too much of his time preparing for an encounter like this, or all of it.

Tenchi tried to swallow naturally, wondered how he should hold the sword, and nearly crumbled altogether, far from any idea as to what that would involve. By already assuming that his former host had planned out the information he'd be giving and withholding, and suggesting at the same time that something might slip, he was likely trying to make him more nervous than generous.

**_As_ nervous? Or maybe that's his way of surrendering how ignorant he is. He's obviously hiding fear, but he isn't trying to puff up his confidence---not that much anyway.**

In another moment Tenchi decided that Seita's face completely matched his plain voice. Much as he tried to measure his fear, this version was too mortal; much the same when he tried to measure his danger. Finding humanity would clearly be better left for better places.

**And if he can ask tricky questions then I can give indirect answers.**

"Follow me."

With the hope that he'd been unreadable, Tenchi turned and led the way back to the car, thanking everything that he only had to fake a few confident steps before they were echoed, fake or not.

000

The gravel in what might never be a paved parking lot minimized worries that the following steps could sneak into his own. Tenchi had tensed a few times, almost nauseously, during such absurd thoughts as Seita resembling a student following the principle back to his office for discipline, as the Ghost of Madness being brought back as a guest in the place that should have executed him.

Tenchi rested his palm against the top of the van door, though he didn't feel tired at all.

**Well he also better be too confused to speak, damn it.**

The sword had gone back in his pocket not too long after remembering he was still in public, but now, with no more cover than the space between a van and a cheap street racer, he just had to hold it again. Hoping that Seita would see the movement, see it and tremble, see it and fall to his knees, made him feel like ants were making air holes in his bloated carcass tongue. The siege continued on for half and more a minute.

**This is just as insane as it was when Washu first mentioned it.**

Seita shifted his feet, making Tenchi raise his head, slow and slight.

"Whatever your family is now---"

However much this was a continuation of the same theme, however long he'd been preparing it, every intuition and the only one spoke to Tenchi, comparing the tone of their last encounter to this, to eyes he could feel searching him, daring him to understand.

**But now he's not sure if he still wants to die.**

**_He's actually afraid_. **

Tenchi turned as quick as cautious could be. Seita had kept his arms crossed, had kept his face angled down, but was now staring in with the only blue, striking out from what was hardly more than what had been hauled, unconscious and frail, into Washu's lab. All the deceit, all the cruelty, all the glorified madness visited on his family, the universe, had come from a gaunt and almost homely man. A conversation that could cripple the strongest mind, a power that thrived to undermine existence, what could only be stopped by its own weight; all grasped and wielded by one mortal mind.

And in a miniscule narrowing, Tenchi knew that the blue saw what he saw. And that helped it say what it had started:

"-I am still what they remember."

And the negative and neutral meanings wove so desperately together that the one invariably ate the other, cursing with a full mouth that two had ever existed. Years of fighting with honor swung up into the guts of abomination with an intoxicating, self-righteous fear. In as much time the same fist swung into the now even lower side of Seita's face, and for a moment even petrified trees could be felled.

The taller man went down like a tower of cardboard tubes, turning 90 degrees from the force of the second blow and falling onto his backpack with a heavy crunch. Tenchi looked down, hearing burst windshields, dragged limbs, and pleas that coughed up wet gravel.

He flexed his fists and watched Seita lift his head into his hand. The fluid glistened on his shaky fingers, scooped out from where his teeth had cut into his cheek. There was enough of it for Tenchi to see that it was red, red and silver, copper and paint pen. A casual observer would probably only take it for blood.

Once again, their eyes were hidden from each other.

At either end of conceptual justice and natural law, their meeting rooms were left empty. You were lucky and only maybe likely to get in trouble for having such huge insulated spaces to yourself. Play make-believe in them or be more than alone.

Having the first person he'd ever truly hated at his mercy, considering that it might all still be an elaborate illusion; both took either end of a breath. Tenchi felt, too far ahead for his throbbing fist to catch up, increasingly less like an avenger and more like someone without control. A new emptiness waited on the horizon, but Ryoko's eyes flashed through his thoughts in full brilliance, erasing the race, and pulling down a tear. He wiped it away before walking the full distance around the van to look into Seita.

It wasn't like looking down at all. The guilt had already collapsed in on itself. Even if Seita looked prepared not to gaze up from his fingers till someone spoke his name, clearly lost as to how to define his own shock, there was enough mortality there for Tenchi to take it as humanity. Neither of them needed more than one thing to say, but if either could think of only one thing then the other could be thinking of as many as he liked.

A thought of the weight and he felt it shift.

"I need your help."

Tenchi didn't think of wiping the blood away before offering his hand, nor did Seita when he took it.

000

It was reflex rather than instinct to reach for the radio the moment they pulled off campus and into heavy traffic. Tenchi had known within seconds of leaving his parking spot that he wouldn't last through a dead silent ride with the former guest, and yet he froze mid-lean, his hand just grazing the dial. He'd prepared a silent curse on the reminder of what overcrowding really meant but, blue or black, it was swept away amid a horrific lapse.

**What in the hell kind of music would-**

Forcing the belief that intuition beat impulse, he left memories in static and turned to the first news channel he could find. In a short time it confirmed that yes, they would indeed be stuck in traffic for at least an hour.

By focusing on the windshield's reflection, Tenchi could see just enough of what was now Seita, using some white rectangle to erase the last of his blood. If there was a bruise, then there was a bruise, and Tenchi resolved to deal with that then, if he had to. And just as a transparent mirage was plenty, he decided an hour or so of news radio could make up for a year of knowing nearly nothing about his own country.

Overcrowding and mistrust were still popular flavors.

Seita continued lolling his gaze out the window as if they were already gliding down a country road. Whatever his actual expression, Tenchi wasn't ready to risk a step out of important worldwide events for a stand in the reality sitting next to him.

---

Two out of three usually wasn't so bad. Map showed a route through the tunnel would save time, radio gave no mention, and intuition had said that most others would want to avoid it.

Soft lights inside the concrete Leviathan made reflections stand out. Fortunately no one was testing the acoustics with their horns as they did in the TV traffic jams; it was getting hard enough to hear the radio.

Tenchi could see himself as much as he could see the bumper in front of him, as much as he saw a taxi patron storm by, and imagined a rickshaw pulling in. The image of his passenger's face was entirely obscured under a single carefully placed glare. Any minute now they'd advance and he'd be able to change his dumbfounded reflection.

**How could he _possibly_ be sleeping? **

**But why would he want to fake it?**

**How would I find out?**

Cramping from his temples down to his hands, he thrust his eyes down at the steering wheel, expecting white knuckles, feeling white knuckles but seeing a pink tremble. The heavy thud to reassert his grip made him hold his breath, hating the space between fear and hope of it rousing the sleeper. He supposed Washu's transmissions could reach the phone even through a tunnel, and assumed she could probably teleport the van and them out of this mess, if she really wanted to.

"Hen---hs-bound by its-"

Tenchi's throat iced over, and he waited for his heart to loosen its grip on his ribs. Seita had just mumbled, in something like the voice he was more familiar with. Turning off the radio was an acceptable reflex.

"Mother's collision---called children of-"

Again, mixed with murmurs, though Tenchi was certain now that it wasn't quite the same sharpened whisper.

"---n the feh-mn.....befell more than those numbered.....who fled before the hollow."

Rolling his head over, the smallest of frets, possibly caused only by the headrest seam that had stamped a line across his already discolored cheek. Thinking on a bruise again, how it could darken into view in hours as easily as days, it was hard to tell, then hard to admit that Seita's sleeping eyes might have been peaceful.

A random eye movement, breath or words barely waving the line between his lips. Tenchi held the wheel till circulation screamed. But surely, Tenchi assured himself, whatever he'd said, it was mixed enough for even the sharpest of ears to mishear, and could just as easily be misquoted in the first place.

**Misquoted?**

**How in the hell do I know he's quoting something?**

"Blis-tam.....bring forward-auh-passive icons. Name-over-all.....name cold-bright."

Chill by chill it returned, the stare over all, gaping back. The vibration in Tenchi's knuckles unaffected by the weight of his forehead, he was certain and desperate that hyperventilating could replace sobs. And they did, for the whole and second moment till some morbid, even masochistic curiosity stopped everything for a closer listen. Amazement waited for no proper time to see that Seita was hardly stirring, speaking more clearly, with a piece of something timid.

"Who would so cu-cush---des-air.....art and mercy. Together in-em-brace."

It could even be reverence now, as it actually wasn't pomp, and couldn't be fear.

Tenchi looked up sharply to stare again at the bumper in front of him and the hundreds before it still unmoved. Between moments of wonder, and pleas that this new bitter eeriness would stop, he remembered a professor giving him a few cents about the vertical arrangement of Japanese characters, how perfectly a piece of classic verse or philosophy fitted a wall plaque, and yet could never maintain its immortal power if turned and fitted to a westerner's bumper sticker.

"Ds-eh-kay-shun claimed sov-n---m-their delirium upheld."

**Should I wake him?**

"Milk of Martyrs---surrender bt-b-k to decay---faith f-ced couplings wit---apathy."

**It's impossible, but he almost does sound afraid.**

Tenchi waited with a tense scowl for some kind of malicious satisfaction to grasp him, to take some joy from the idea that Seita, of all people, was having nightmares of his own.

There were visions of crying women.

"Beaten---ready retreat---to the white."

With a handful of broken puzzle pieces, he waited for more, sure they would offer no answers and sure that they were important.

"Swallow the ten-ents of self, lest all glory unto all glory become-s-innocence."

**No. If I let it out now I might not be able to cut it off.**

The saltwater glide went unnoticed as he reached, eyes closed, to position one lever, then the other, listening as closely as he'd been taught. The secured van seemed to idle more contently, its cargo like someone before the sea, staring again with the same awe they'd long devoted to the stars.

"Lest---ll glory-nto-nssense-"

**It's really him.**

Tenchi rotated his fist, ashamed that he could not completely stop the trembling, tight as he made it.

"White s-nto innocence."

**It's still him.**

"Cold as innocence."

**He was a person.**

And Seita's next whisper found its hands, began curling its fingers round and found its teeth, beneath his throat.

"Bright as The Child's Abysss."

Though he didn't strike it dangerously hard, Tenchi increased the pressure on the horn, blind-thinking that this would steadily raise its volume.

He didn't even glance up over at his passenger for nearly half a minute, the horn carrying through half of that. Avoiding whatever the windows might show, he swallowed, heard the passenger seat adjust to a more upright position, and sprang.

As many attentions as he'd drawn with the horn; all of them might have stayed for the blue light. But this was modern Japan, land of daily advances in distraction technology. By this reasoning thus just another reason to show you'd had enough of apathy runoff.

"I want-"

Tenchi spoke, carelessly helplessly distraught. He kept his extended arm steady enough to remain focused on his other hand, the steering wheel. Seita watched his own slow hands fold and hold in his lap, the solid light above them all but unnoticed.

"I want you to know---that Washu deceived us."

Being able to say it gave him a little more confidence, if less than any relief.

"With some careful language she let us believe that you were dead."

Tenchi quieted his breathing by a few levels.

**Do I want to give him a chance to respond?**

By hardly a twitch, he began to glance over at the passenger, retreating the same way.

**No.**

"I asked _her_ why you were still alive. And now," Tenchi looked up into the windshield and Seita stared back; overflowing faced hollowed intimidation.

"I'm asking you," timing question to gesture was easy enough. But with the light of the sword closer to his neck, to the underside of his eyes, intimidation tilted in Seita's favor. Tenchi merely tightened his jaw and clarified, much as he knew there wasn't a need.

"Why, after all you said about wanting to be destroyed, have you survived in urban Japan for so long?"

Seita took a long yet almost invisible breath, blinked slowly, and sunk his eyes toward the blade, a student escaping a professor's scorn though their guilt and fear were clearly inspired elsewhere. His hands unfolded, and smoothed---no---moved up the thighs of his pants. Tenchi could only think to bring the blade higher.

"I said:"

Violent promises met confusion as Seita's hands tested the glove compartment, pushed, braced. Tenchi could see the taller man pressing back into his headrest, not for support.

"Why are you-" Barely audible. Hardly intimidating.

The machine was locked and released with only a second for Tenchi to deactivate the sword. He moved the hilt away gracelessly, a child keeping a toy from its younger sibling, hiding its hand from a new pain. Entirely unable to guess whether Seita had truly intended what he'd attempted, Tenchi couldn't consider questions of required physics, even with a laugh. He breathed quick and quiet, staring wildly at the man who'd almost swung his forehead into his knees, who now looked carsick.

Seita lifted his head with the faintest of grins, perhaps all of it on Tenchi's side. He looked at the glove compartment much as his driver had looked at the steering wheel. With the last of the noticeable breaths he could allow himself, Tenchi glanced about with small relief that they seemed to have lost any audience. The practical limits of a light sword inside a minivan began to ooze up like jeering bile, however, Seita's speech floated down in a precise counteraction.

"It would be gratuitous for me to relate that cities in your country are difficult to survive in, even for natives."

Seita closed his eyes for his voice, a fog around his falling feathers.

"Furthermore, it would be lazy to hide behind anecdotes about confessing to someone preconditioned to doubt you."

Gulping his grin away, one less than affected, he began to sit up, eventually resting chin to knuckle, right elbow to left wrist, thinking withdrawal, speaking diplomacy.

"I am still alive because I've been doing domestic work at a youth hostile in exchange for room and board. I am still alive because there was enough in Washu's false paperwork to pay for hospital bills, a new pair of clothing, and a card to carry it in. I am still alive because she left my pre-engineered language center intact."

Gulping ten less than humble, Seita looked out at the train of unmoved cars. The frown was illegible.

"I am still alive because Washu did not kill me. I am still alive because the ghost of my will to learn is heavier than my will to kill myself. I am alive now because you chose not to kill me---there in that hallway."

Tenchi gulped one more than paralyzed. He closed his eyes, he tried to crush the sword in his hand, but everything was memory and the tears maintained an agonizingly slow purge. He could see the swallowed scar in Mihoshi's every move, the murdered friend in Sasami's, the surreal loss of certainty in his grandfather and Washu alike. His helpless father.....helpless as his father, he knew that he had Aeka's heart, that he shared Ryoko's soul. Their wails would claw the sanity from his chest.

"You know that exchange was a bluff---on both our parts, but it was necessary. You---whatever it is you plan---"

**He's still afraid.**

"And, save that you are taking me to my death, each theory continues to be more absurd than the last."

**He's not immortal.**

"Each moment complicates my desire to be destroyed, by you, by Washu, by Ryoko, by-"

"You," Tenchi managed to beat the next tear back.

Seita breathed indirect patience for sickly resolve.

"As I said, I have no will to-"

"No," Tenchi pushed aside Seita's resolve like a desperate bully. "_You_, Washu wants _you_."

Tenchi pocketed the sword and repositioned his hands on the wheel, his eyes in his lap.

"You have to help us."

**He's still Seita.**

Memory replaced some of his blood, circulating how his grandfather had recovered only to retreat, how the truth between two rivals had been revealed, the reward for both being a rebirth, dropped cold, unreceived.

The silence eventually stopped counting. And the plain voice was sudden enough to command.

"Tenchi."

Seita gestured with his eyes to the advancing cars before hiding them back outside the window.

"I think the road is clearing."

Seconds before he could get the van moving again a horn behind them made to second the motion.

000

The ambulances parked in the rearview mirror had tightened Tenchi's throat, but as it turned out the accident had meant less than half an hour more travel time. Where the highways became roads the litter became more offensive, then absent when the shopping centers became suburbs, decorative trees losing dog fences and gaining gardens. When more houses became homes the roads became streets, and as many times as he'd passed them he still read the names, looked for changes. How the street became a road, a stranger might have guessed it would just lead back to the beginning. Horizon trees pulled in the sun to strain his eyes along artificially sculpted riverbanks, bridges that blended almost seamlessly with the paving, bridges that did not, and ponds that failed to return in the dry years. The thickening forest finally obscured the sunset.

As they passed the road that shrine visitors would have taken, the pavement turned back to gravel, driving in dust twice in one day, the van would need to be washed.

**Maybe I'll get the girls to help me.**

Realizing then denying that it was possible to be too good at forgetting horror, Tenchi tried to keep his eyes on the road, the last mile before the gate and whatever Washu could have possibly devised for bringing in a guest unnoticed.

The phone rang and Tenchi tensed, but was thankful not to have jumped.

"Hello."

Washu spoke evenly, if not overly businesslike. Tenchi glanced at Seita, still gazing out the window, probably not sleeping, probably certain whom the driver was speaking to.

"Hi---is everything okay---well yes, there was an accident---on the---on the road I mean, that's why we're a little late---we---yes, he's here---uh---where---how far outside the gate---oh---okay---bye."

He hadn't heard Seita move a muscle, and knew well enough how to keep one ear open on the phone, but when Tenchi glance over again his guest was sitting with better posture, arms folded across his lap, eyes on the house.

**You've got to say something before he does, keep him from panicking.**

**Him---yes.**

**So long as no one comes running out to meet us for at least a minute we should be okay.**

"And now?"

It wasn't terror like before, but Tenchi still gave the steering wheel some subtle abuse.

"Now," he found and thanked a reserve of calm built from the detachment gathered along the road, "we're going to pull up a hundred meters or so from the house, and I'm going to hand you the phone."

Tenchi removed the small device from his taught pocket even more clumsily this time.

"You'll just hold onto it, she'll transport you, and I'll meet you both back in the lab."

**How the Hell can Washu sound so calm?**

Seita was looking at him, he knew, but he didn't take his eyes off the road, or the phone cradled in his hands as if it were counting the meters left before he could breathe.

"Tenchi."

Waiting, expecting it didn't help when nervousness could sound so much like seduction.

**He knows I heard him, why is he waiting so long? Is he waiting for me to look at him when I hand over the phone?**

"I apologize for procrastinating this question-"

**Oh, Tsunami, please be here. **

"But I see that this is likely my last chance."

It was unnatural for Seita to clear his throat, not merely unusual. Tenchi tried not to speed up but still abused the wheel.

"You mentioned asking Washu yourself.....the question.....why I'm still alive."

**Melancholy? No. **

**Dammit, why can't I find any satisfaction that _he_ might be the one afraid for once.**

"What did she tell you, Tenchi? Why didn't she kill me?"

Tenchi began applying the brakes early. When they came to a full stop he extended the phone hoping to drop it in his passenger's hand without having to look up from his passenger's ribs. A hand extended under his, slow yet without a trace of ceremony.

And he couldn't let it drop, not just yet, couldn't answer with silence, strike with ignorance. Tenchi didn't like anything about associating Seita and the phrase 'kept in the dark'. The tips of all but human fingers were indistinct against the edges of his palm, and the corners of his voice couldn't help but betray confusion's secret love for desperate hope.

"She says it doesn't matter."

Pulling his hand back but letting it fall in the same movement, Tenchi adjusted to giving the right answer when he'd hardly known. Mantras searched in him till the slight hum of mechanical teleportation received his cargo. It sounded enough like the biological variety that Tenchi didn't resist associating the most obvious memory and didn't try to hold himself up. Uncomfortable as the wheel was for all its tenderizing, strong as everyone would have to be, his sobs held him there, praying guilt that for a while no one would realize he was home.

000

The smell of dinner made the pain in his stomach louder than the alarm of a door that moans more under a gentle hand. Tenchi shrank at the noise and bent at hunger pains as vengeful as any of the memories oppressed so far. They had started eating without him, but it was clear that they had not yet spoken to each other. Naturally they'd heard him enter, and of course they could hear him approach, but apparently he hadn't listened for the difference between plates being cleared and plates being cleared from the table.

"Oh, hi Tenchi." Mihoshi brushed some hair aside with the dry part of her hand and worked up a smile.

"Hi, Mihoshi." In his still slightly bent state, it was understandable, to Tenchi at least, that he chose to give a short nod.

"Don't worry, we saved some for you," Sasami trotted up with a bunched-up towel in her left fist and welcomed him with a hug, also trying not to spread any dishwater. "Washu said you were stuck in traffic, was there an accident?"

She asked the question and waited a moment before moving to look up at him. He hugged her back into him, away from his eyes, and made toward the kitchen without looking down.

Aeka kept her hands in the sink, while Washu leaned against the counter where she should have been drying dishes. Her eyes lifted but her arms remained crossed. Tenchi's voice increased its distance.

"Yeah."

She would have looked as he felt had she looked half as afraid. Within the unspoken understandings that swarmed, garbled and wailing between them, the more obvious fell first. Telling the others that Tenchi was caught in traffic and that they should begin dinner without him was no real deception, save for allowing them the assumption that he'd actually called and told her so himself. He thought he saw her prepare an eighth of a half-smile to relax his worries that they'd been worried. It was no real deception.

"Yeah, Sasami. There was an accident, but it still happened on the faster route."

Washu began to look over at Aeka, then quickly looked the other way, not sure what she wanted to draw attention to. The lines shimmered under her eyes for an even smaller moment.

"Tenchi," she began before he could finish his first compulsive step toward Aeka.

"Tenchi, I-" Aeka interjected her own, incidentally less formal tone in the next second.

Washu sized up the space between them, and both opposite corners. Tenchi froze, also looking at both women, settling on the first when the second decided to take another few moments. Science tried as much as an immobile person could to turn her own fear into a warning. It worked like a difficult breath and Tenchi swallowed it whole, speaking just before it sank in completely.

"Excuse me, Aeka, but I have to help Washu with something first. We'll-"

"Are you guys okay?"

Washu and Tenchi swung their heads back toward the table where Sasami had stopped trying to figure out what to do with the dishtowel, was now holding it like a nearly forgotten comfort blanket and pouring worry out of undeniably loving though unusually mature eyes. When the two looked back at each other they instantly realized it had been the worst possible move. Swallowing like conspirators, feeling little better, Tenchi made room for more worry, letting his eyes drift away from Washu and back to Aeka. She had not turned, and her younger sister did not relent.

"Is something-"

"Hey Sasami," Washu began in an exaggerated whisper.

"Huh.....what?" Confusion blocked out to make a more innocent face.

"Do you think you could keep Mihoshi busy tonight, I've got some important things to take care of." Washu smirked, nodding her head outside to where the now seemingly oldest and clumsiest people in the house were trying to fold away some porch chairs.

A cute conspiracy between clever girls. How Washu had pulled off such a mood change and managed to wield it as well; Tenchi almost gawked as Sasami blinked a few times and hid a faux-scolding smirk.

"Oh, all right, little-Washu. Be careful down there."

Washu turned to him, drained but determined. When she walked toward the lab Tenchi knew he wouldn't be far behind.

"Your plate's in the fridge, Tenchi." Sasami walked more casually past him to hang up the dishtowel.

"Thanks, I'm not really," Tenchi's head was turning even as he spoke, "Aeka, we'll-"

He waited, and waited, and he was going to sweat at this rate.

"Yes, Tenchi."

**She knows something's wrong.....she's either going to cry or smack me or-**

"Aeka," he forced and he forced and still didn't know, "Aeka, we'll-"

**Dammit! Say 'We'll talk later'! Talk later!**

"We won't be long."

Tenchi made to point absently toward the lab, but his hand fell, dangled till he made for a fist and failed at that too. In a few moments of waiting for her to respond he became afraid she would respond. Eyes closed, he tried not to hurry away with too much noise.

Aeka turned and watched Tenchi hang his head at the open door to Washu's lab. For half a minute they remained unflinching, till he raised and entered, till she turned back to the dishes with clouded eyes unchanged.

000

Swinging about with a furrowed brow, Tenchi almost didn't notice Washu standing next to him, and hardly changed his expression when he did.

"Washu, what is this?"

Beyond the stern countenance was a meadow of vibrant paper-thin grass nearly tall enough for a girl Washu's size, with humble hair, to lie down and disappear in. The lush green put turquoise to shame and reminded Tenchi of exaggerated tropical brochures, these waters rushing to fantastically curved tree boughs rather than whiteout beaches. The countless tiny, mild periwinkle blossoms made the rough bark crackle under their weight and wonder where the matching sandy cobblestone paths were.

No fountains either, but a short walk ahead, where the trees were thickest, there was the sound of a small river, or a stream with many stones. Again turning his attention to all sides, even the pristine sky, Tenchi looked for the borders, some fence or wall making this all a garden rather than a suspiciously picturesque section of an unknown world. No bunnies, no birds, no fawns, no satyrs.

"This is all just an illusion, right?" Tenchi's displeasure with such surprises was overshadowed by the persistence of his boyish fear.

"No, a relic." Washu stated coldly and began walking toward the promised water.

Tenchi moved to fold his arms, but stormed after her for two steps, felt out of control at four, and was glad to keep pace alongside her. The more she explained the more he hoped her tone would change.

"This is one of the earliest models of what they're now keeping Ryoko in. It's kind of a way to keep someone thinking they're on vacation who is actually serving a sentence. They're banned now, something about cruel and unusual."

Washu began walking more slowly, glancing off to the treetops on her right while Tenchi stared down at her left, then again in every direction, awkwardly trying to stroll rather than shuffle.

"But something more about problems with twisting space; it only occupies about as much area as you can see, but each time we get close to an edge it turns us back in a different direction with a different arrangement of the same landscaping programs."

Washu took a long step over a mostly buried boulder that looked like dolphin skin and leaned forward a bit as she kept walking. Something on her left, Tenchi's left, and he almost hesitated to look at such an obvious indication. The same trees, though each with a seemingly distinct twist to their branches, one or two were even wilting for no apparent reason. She was looking ahead again in the next moment.

"It's kind of like attaching a kaleidoscope to a rodent wheel."

Tenchi wanted to fold his arms, in some way, front or back, whatever might help him feel like he was walking with her rather than being led through another mystery. There was even a nice breeze, a near perfect temperature for swimming, napping, hide and go seek.

**I hate---**

He finally settled on his pockets.

**I hate this. I can't even enjoy what should just be another of her nice little gardens. **

A few more stones gathered where the meadow gradually rose into the thicker forest. Tenchi stopped and stared in disbelief as Washu almost tripped over one. She tried, halfheartedly, to play it off like a skip. She kept walking and Tenchi caught up with simple strides. The first trees were tall and independent enough that he hardly needed to duck or twist on their path. There was still plenty of, he realized now, sunless sunshine to make the shadows look like shade.

Their footsteps were louder now, as was the water, as was the silence of everything else. Tenchi tried to time how often he glanced over for some emotion on Washu's face, but it just made the constricted place seem deceptively large. It only slowed time.

"You could have killed him, you know."

Tenchi watched the petals grinding into moist earth beneath them. He tensed, ready to shake, hurrying himself to decide whether she'd meant her statement as a reprimand, or as a missed opportunity. His haste fueled confusion till the two-bird answer fell from the sky before he could appreciate how obvious it was.

"Sorry."

If it sounded insincere, it wasn't. And if it sounded insignificant, it wasn't. Tenchi looked up and tried to look ready.

**I can---I have to do this---if it means I have to cut him open or shake his hand---**

Tenchi looked back down.

"He's about as frail as the average human now."

He nodded too faintly to imagine she'd seen it.

"You, Tenchi, are not."

Tenchi allowed himself frustration, convinced he was too drained for rage.

**Just wait till Ryoko gets a hold of him then. That's right, say that. Idiot.**

Washu stopped, taking a break had she needed one. Tenchi watched her reach up and wrap her palm against the underside of a large branch, holding it there as she thought.

**This must be her idea of making me more ready for the---for the prisons this time, or to put me at ease when she explains how the HELL we're supposed to-**

He leaned against a tree trunk with a locked arm, wishing he had a branch to break off.

"So, where is he, anyway?"

Tenchi felt worse, but stronger. Hopefully Washu would get to business now.

**Ryoko---**

Forcing an image of Seita sitting, bending forward in a doctor's chair, speaking to her till she closed her eyes, cried and cried and cried till she embraced him back when he reached out. Tenchi's arm bent against the tree.

"He should be around here somewhere." Washu stated, nearly sighed, much like looking for a pencil in a toolbox when somebody might be listening.

Tenchi stared at the sickest joke in any language.

Washu kept walking, her companion following with slow, long steps, and wild glances into every other shadow and every single gleam.

The pieces approached slow, but were eager to be more fit.

"I guess I see why you were talking so softly on that last phone call."

Though his tone was losing life, Washu's gained none.

"Risky planning on my part, but at least it made you look considerate and me---up to less."

Tenchi glanced over with the beginnings of sarcastic venom, but felt ill at ease staying focused in any one direction.

"So," he tried a pathetic breathless chuckle, "did you have a tracking device put in his ear or something."

"No, I had him put in here so that I wouldn't have to check him first, and wouldn't have to leave the table."

"You mean," a little more breath this time, "you haven't even _looked_ at him yet?"

Stomping still, Tenchi's fingertips tested the sides of his head, reaching the puppet stick over his flailing grimace.

Washu stopped, and moved her head to speak over her shoulder with no real intention of looking back.

"Would you like to prepare me, Tenchi?"

**Is she being SARCASTIC?! **

Before he could consider how to raise the accusation, Washu began walking downward. They'd apparently reached the top of the hill without even noticing. Beyond her he could see the stream, clear water over black stones, flanked by spindly, leafless black trees.

"Washu."

He hoped it could sound as much like a warning as a plea, but it seemed to have no effect regardless. Tenchi walked, long steps, but he kept them weary, if not as quiet.

**Maybe---maybe she does realize how insane this is.**

Washu veered slightly to the left, and Tenchi followed, almost feeling like he was sneaking up on her.

**But this isn't 'just crazy enough to work'; it's her daughter. It's Ryoko.**

Tenchi clenched his fists and bit down on the weight, the stones in his lungs and the tar in his bones wanted him to look. If he opened both his eyes at once, they could break him, then he could drag what was left to her, he could pull her to him and cry till nothing.

He stopped to push over another tree. Strong, full, calm breath.

Washu was walking slower. Tenchi followed. She began to step lightly, then to the left. When she hid behind a tree he did the same. One tree, seeing nothing around either side, became another, till all of Tenchi's stealth brought him up behind Washu. The trunk she chose could hardly hide them both, even if she'd had humbler hair.

"Do you see him?" Tenchi asked in a moderate whisper, not even bothering to see around her side of the tree. There was nothing but a steeper descent and the stream on his own.

"No."

Tenchi took a step back and watched his hands clench.

"Washu, what are we doing here? How do we know-"

He tested his scalp, seriously considered letting go, pulling till he had his pain in his fists.

"That's precisely the point, Tenchi." Washu turned and leaned against the tree trunk.

When she looked at him, unborn tears and deep underlines, green was emerald, smooth and clear from the heat of ages. Her fear was different, and this helped Tenchi realize that he did not want his to equal it. Putting trust in another person to help the only person, putting it outside reason then outside reason's reach. He couldn't maintain a simpler fear and still not look as confident.

"He's in here with us, but what we need from him, we'll never get it if we can't stop thinking of him as the wolf in the forest."

Washu visibly shrank, eyes to the ground under Tenchi's feet.

"He's not going to jump up from a trap door, he's not going to fly out of a tree. Even if he's spent these last months training to be an assassin....."

**Does she want me to reassure her that he hasn't?**

"No, this is my waiting room, but this is no longer a cell. He is here at our disposal, but he's-"

Washu leaned forward and off the tree, gently, absently holding her own forehead with a soft palm, then her mouth. She pulled herself into Tenchi's arms without a thought. His hands flexed above her shoulders for a moment before he spread them around her back. Making sure she wasn't crying, relieved for this, he took another look around and let his own eyes drag his head down.

"But," Washu swallowed painfully, "but before-"

Tenchi felt a tremor of fear as she clutched his lapels. She pushed herself back and held them both up with flat palms, her tone cooled but stayed alive.

"He was the greatest counselor in his galaxy."

Suspicion fell like a shimmering needle into a punchbowl of ice water. If it was a compliment, even if it was still justification, Tenchi remembered his mother. He was ready, as soon as Washu took her next breath, to push her against the tree till she heard herself.

Across the stream, up another picturesque bank, someone was walking without stealth. Tenchi tilted, then glanced back as Washu took her hands from him. In seconds she'd secured her hair. He pressed his back to the tree and leaned around it again, sure that Seita was still far enough away not to notice them.

"There's another reason," Washu spoke at his side more quietly than some whispers.

"What?" Tenchi whispered even lower.

"Did you see how the trees around the stream were dead, how the stream was clean and clear yet everything around it was black?"

"Y-yeah, so?" Tenchi let his own curiosity hang out.

Washu readjusted some of her hair. Wound-guilt traced fear.

"Look---see if he notices too."

Tenchi, convinced he was ready to step out from the tree the moment he was spotted, peered around, thankful that Seita was watching his footing. He looked for satisfaction or relief in the trouble still had in using such a grounded body. Much as justifiable sadism had failed him before, he could feel his face sinking now as the tall figure looked up and down the stream like someone surveying the smoldering foundations of a home.

"It was a common symbol for a time."

Washu gave away some warmth, and Tenchi moved back to catch it, hands still in his pockets wherever they were. She looked up at him again, no tears, no lines, nothing but strangled uncertainty till she turned to the side, ready to speak over her shoulder, through the trees, into her reacquired prisoner.

"They called it 'empty-water'. Clear as crystal, yet it turns life black, a way to remind them that the essence of living things was out of their reach. The program turns it back into light the moment anyone tries to drink it, or drown in it."

Again, more carefully, Tenchi stole a look. Seita was crouched beside the stream, pinching his chin, thinking himself pale.

"I'm going to explain our case to him now. Please watch, and join us if you are seen."

Tenchi looked over and stepped back, almost having to bite his tongue to suppress a yelp. It might even have been endearing, might have been attempting so, but Washu's adult form didn't carry the same allure this time. Her eyes avoided his, her formal green pant and blouse combo replaced by a neck-strangling coal dress. No décor, no nostalgia, and little sound as she let it drag over the fallen petals. Regal and imposing as she may have looked in a different setting, her stride was less than informal, the way a carefree plant would stroll, the way a tired Goddess would approach.

From his vantage point, Tenchi was surprised at how long it took Seita to look up from the water. This next observation added that 'empty' also meant it caught no fallen petals and gave no reflections, save of false sunlight. Washu was standing directly across the stream, no more than three meters, when the empty gaze decided to acknowledge her. Too far to hear them, much less make out their expressions, he let his palm test the bark of the nearly-real tree.

**Please, don't say she expects me to be her bodyguard.**

**No, of course not. **

**Even if she says her lab won't be at full power for a while---she could probably kill him faster than I could.**

Washu held her hands, loosely dangling in her lap, and stepped forward to stand in the stream. Shin deep, it soaked the edges of her dress and let the program convincingly turn coal into onyx. The contrast of her pale face and hands, her brilliant if tightly subdued red hair, standing there before what may as well be a vagrant, Tenchi felt his mouth fall and his brow rise. The thought came and went at its leisure, that this was a scene almost worthy of its audience.

No sooner had he prepared to consider this more deeply than the blossoms began to fade in and out and through each of the eyes of the women in his extended family. Seamless as the wind that moved it, the colors kept Tenchi all but hypnotized that it could look so natural, so like any accelerated autumn. He did not see how this setting would give the scientist more resolve than a darkened room with a restraining chair.

Still they stared at each other, hardly seeming to breath, till Tenchi nearly readied himself to jog down at them, if only to cut this silence that had long turned tangible sadness back on and through itself. The same stitch, sewing its self, waiting for blood.

Washu chose to speak first, and as Tenchi strained to hear her he began to move and count down how many trees still grew between them.

"You told me the truth."

Washu watched her hands, still holding each other low against her dress.

"You told me who you were, and as thorough as Kagato may have been---there are still a few traces left."

Tightening her fingers, she lifted her eyes as if solemn could best serene.

"In a small publication, you wrote an essay on the use of things like 'empty water' in holo-prisons. You called it malicious, petty."

Seita casually stirred his fingers into the stream, only looking at it for a moment before he lifted his hand, the door to the tunnel of his gaze, a hollowing secret held like poison. He turned the cup over and let the water spill from his palm.

"Did you want my help designing better prisons, professor?"

A tilt of the head so slight, then sharp, the eyes narrowing up half a grin for double edges. Tenchi could see, a few meters closer now, that Seita was looking directly into her. A few seconds breathing behind the tree, and at the second glance she seemed unaffected, while the glare might have lost some luster.

"No, I want you to lead a jailbreak."

Tenchi echoed and magnified the disbelief he saw in the consuming blue. It was all his own when Seita lowered himself altogether. The breeze in the blossoms tried to die in gold amid the silent minute.

"I see, it's-"

Seita began massaging his hands together, keeping his fingers flat as wings or flags. Having neither solemn nor serene did not prevent him from setting them at each other's throats.

"It's your daughter---I presume."

"Yes."

Two more trees before he'd surely be spotted, he could almost hear them now.

He rested against the tree and felt the energy leaving him, not sure if it was rising into the trees as the last of gold hurried through yellow and back into natural pinks.

"My---'talents' were never especially---"

Washu remained unmoved, even as she went from watching the stream move her dress to crawling her eyes up to where Seita would have to meet them. The fallen petals changed color again as he balanced his crouch with fingertips posed for a pyramid. One hand tried to smear some into the earth; those that were not buried or planted continued to change in unison with the rest.

From the small distance, Tenchi was more certain now of Seita's fear, lifting empty into ancient ocean, than he was with a guest close enough to touch. One tree away, doubting that he hadn't been heard yet, Tenchi could make out even their soft voices.

"Your talents-"

Washu waded forward, hands still unmoved, till they were nearly in range of each other.

"-are gone."

Seita looked down, but not away, rose to his feet, but did not stand. Tenchi sidestepped, removed the sword, and held it at his side. The taller man stepped into the stream like a spotlight he did not want to acknowledge.

**Please---Please**

"All you have now-"

Their eyes never wavered, never pitied, only strength-for strength if only a glass husk left for strength-the strength to hold pain. They were more than close enough to embrace, Washu's hands held in front, Seita's hanging lifeless at his sides.

"-are your gifts."

Tenchi began a mantra inspired by all that he'd done to convince himself of Washu's safety, of her being more dangerous than any Jurai weapon. His own steps forward were still decisively more cautious. If he was going to understand the meanings in this he'd have to be more than he was.

**Washu's keeping both of us in suspense, but with him---she won't even tell _me_ and she expects _him_ to figure it out?! **

Emerald seemed to relent, closing her eyes and lowering her face.

"Tenchi," she called.

He hesitated his next step, then slowed the pace of those left to bring him to the edge of the stream. One of the blackened trees nearly scratched his cheek, and he broke it away without a second thought. Seita glanced over her, showing neither foreknowledge nor surprise.

"Do you love Ryoko?

It came so bluntly and with such finality that Tenchi almost dropped the sword.

"Y-Yes." He said while intending to take a breath. He swallowed nothing and was met with only the necessary memories.

"Seita."

He glanced back down to meet her eyes with a returning frenzy behind his own.

"Do you trust Tenchi?"

The taller man's brow maladjusted, and his bottom lip nearly quivered open. He was slightly more composed when he stared a long moment that the younger man failed to return.

"He never seemed to question," velvet grew in the warm darkened places, the scent between green and black, "whether our recent exchange had been real."

Seita glanced down at Washu, who also continued to avert her eyes. Something softened, or burned away in his face, the fumes carrying richness into his stare.

"Tenchi."

The near-prince of Jurai blinked rapidly in disbelief and faced Abyss without a thought.

"I know what it is to be at someone else's mercy."

Tenchi felt it clearly, that 'I' meant 'we', on both ends of the experience.

"But you still strike me as a particularly merciful person."

A distortion of light made Tenchi wince away then stare back to see Washu in her smaller formal suit.

Seita stared down at her as well, a darker fear creasing his features. Only he heard her speak.

"We shall see."

She reached lazily to the side and touched her holo-keypad the moment it faded into view.

A focal point formed where the two ancient figures stood, sending blackness deeper than the stream to erase the forest. In moments Tenchi could see only them and himself, perfectly, though surrounded by unlit black space. Metallic ropes pulled Seita into a restraining chair quickly enough for Tenchi to share only half of his horror as they sank his tall legs into the floor till he was eye to eye with the genius child.

Washu, like a humorless imitation of an earth doctor, fitted a latex glove over her right hand.

"What's going on?" Tenchi nearly gasped, his next step toward them prompted an answer.

The gloved little hand shot into Seita's neck like a viper, holding his vital cords with enough pressure to swell agonized confusion into the most piercing blue.

Tenchi's breaths raced past the a-rhythmic chokes, gathering speed in sight of his opponent's handicap. And, as they became more strained and greedy, he felt them working up a smile. He grabbed the back of his neck, the emergency break, with both hands.

"Washu! What-What are you doing?!"

"I don't know how gratifying it was to strike him, to really strike him," Washu's monotone was fraying around the edges, but kept eating at its own core to keep its teeth wet.

Seita, eyes closed like melt-wadded balloon rubber, teeth ready to spring, was not convinced he could, but was desperate to break the chair.

"But I can assure you this is better."

Tenchi emitted a struggling effect that filled in for the one restrained as well as it matched the one conflicted.

"D---Dammit Washu! This isn't-"

"No Tenchi, it isn't," a stillborn maniacal laugh managed one twitch upon the floor, "this isn't a demonstration, and this isn't just another experiment."

He thought he noticed her loosening her grip as Seita achieved some measure of consistency in his strangled breaths.

"I'm not sure why you didn't bring back his head, Tenchi. I hoped that it was for Ryoko's sake, I still hope that more than anything. But---I know it could be because you still don't like killing---that you saw how miserable and pitiful he was and you just _couldn't_."

Washu sounded no less dangerous, no less frightening with more control. Tenchi tried then retreated from imagining her eyes.

"But make no mistake, Tenchi, he still thinks he has power, he still thinks-"

"N---n-n....."

Washu straightened her posture and relaxed her grip long enough for Seita to manage two violent coughs. Hardly increasing the pressure, she moved her hand up closer to his jaw.

"Be quiet."

Tenchi, in weak reflex, took a step toward her, hands outstretched but mostly upturned.

"Tenchi."

She was serious, she was nowhere near the calm she imitated, but she was serious.

"I'm going to give you a second chance."

He looked at her with anxious confusion, but was guided over to Seita's face, head angled up as far as he could, eyes closed as tight as possible without looking it, mouth clenched in a frown to make the wearer disappear.

"Say the word, Tenchi, and I'll do it, now, I'll avenge this family and every other."

Letting his arms dangle after a sad attempt to move, he didn't know where, Tenchi just stared.

**I---I can't do _that_!**

"I've done unethical things before---and I can assure you---this won't count especially high on my list."

She was breathing a little more heavily now as well, but her reassurance had become a background to the returning memories, the worst ones replaying with the most clarity. He closed his eyes and swallowed them.

**Yes I could. **

Eyes still closed, he listened to her voice descend.

"I don't know what I was thinking.....I.....I want my daughter back. I-"

Tenchi pulled at his sinus, wiped the wet away to notice that Washu had taken on a shiver.

"Whatever I saw that day, whatever it was that made me send him away---if you don't see it too, if you're not _sure_ it's there---then say the word. I'd rather have his blood on my hands than yours.....than Ryoko's."

Opening his mouth to speak, he reached for his own throat, his fingers wilting when they got too close.

"Very well then."

Washu pulled her hand away with a robotic melodrama, holding it up like a traffic signal as she pulled off the glove, finger by finger, a stretched snap into the steady coughs. With the newly freed hand she reached into her hair and shook it free. Sidestepping directly between them, she extended both arms, leaning a rising gasp into Seita's raw throat.

"I understand how it could still seem wrong for you. We'll do it this way, then."

The false softness where she wallowed her stone voice threatened physical illness on Tenchi, now, and for perhaps the rest.

"I'm going to keep applying pressure, if you want me to stop---if you truly want me stop---just say so."

Tenchi found his voice barehanded, a tin can lid in a pile of rancid organic garbage.

"Bringing him here was _your_ idea! How the hell do you expect him to help us now?!"

"I don't. Do you?"

Tenchi began to pace between modes of panic. In the moment it took to notice the discoloration in Seita's face he froze and poured his horrified gaze onto his physician.

"Please." Tenchi barely heard it in his own throat.

"This is monstrous of me, I know, but unless you really think he can save...if you really want him that close to---"

She had to be crying, he thought, looking over at Seita once more, convulsing with stifled mucus grunts, eyes clenched then swung open. A threat or a plea, he turned away before he could ask.

He reached toward where he'd seen her shoulder, still unwilling to look. At contact, he opened his eyes, looking at the floor, the weight eclipsing the hollow, gold catching sun from the core of The Pit.

"Ryoko."

Tenchi could feel her arms begin to relax in the next moment.

"Please Washu," he swallowed his sob, "we have to-"

In an instant, far too quickly he thought, Washu folded her hands behind her back and turned to face him. He almost tripped backward in surprise.

"It's decided then."

Her face, herself: dry, focused, and unyielding. Behind her the coughs were small infernos smothered by flagship sails catching wider and wider winds.

"By your judgment---he deserves enough life for the chance to save another."

Her champion looked helplessly from her, to her secret weapon, and back.

"Please listen closely, Tenchi. Tomorrow you'll take the shuttle to see Ryoko again, you'll give me the signal when you get inside with her, and I'll transport him over."

Washu began to turn, but stopped as she heard the small spark of life in Tenchi's throat. Though she hadn't intended to, she looked up into whatever might be left to risk her plan.

Her champion just stared, mouth half-agape, at the chair behind her. Turning again, she saw her prisoner, head lax on his neck, chest rising and rising. It nearly lifted his chin before it fell again. She took half of the step between them.

"It must have been awful for you," Washu contemplated with an obscure kind of sympathy, too cold to be sarcasm, "wondering whether you owed me a debt of gratitude---or another eye."

Seita did not respond, save to release the inhalation as a sign that he'd heard her.

"You can be certain now that you owe me nothing; your debt lies with Tenchi, as should your trust."

Washu walked three steps adjacent to them and reached into darkness to touch holo-keys. Seita's restraining unit shifted into a seat, the binds retracting. He slumped forward a little, bracing one forearm across his lap, the other hand reflexively smoothing his throat. No sign of meeting their stares.

"Ryoko has been entirely unresponsive to all contact, if you can return enough of her perception to motivate her out of that cell, we will proceed from there."

Tenchi felt her gaze upon him within moments and flailed his own back. The desperation swam in at the corners as she gestured for him to add his peace. Exhausted, he let himself, all but lazy, he let himself.

"Seita," he began in as clear if not as hopeful a voice as he could, "will you help us?"

He lifted his head enough for them to see the first layer of his eyes. Whatever his emotions, they were also laid raw with exhaustion.

"In the city---I've had a number of opportunities---to 'council' others."

He pulled his velvet stocking inside out, making a dull cotton scarf, a bandage.

"I've taken none of them."

Tenchi began to look towards Washu, but was taken back.

"And still I've forgotten nothing of my time before Kagato," he continued, "and nothing since."

In the moment he took to swallow, Tenchi felt the weight change its texture, its mass, from iron, to wood, to blood.

"For however long my mind lasts, I will do what I can to help you."

Washu caught Tenchi's drained face, then hid her own beginnings of overflow.

"Please wait in my office, I'll try to keep preparations brief." Washu spoke into her keys, uninterested that Seita's chair sank into the darkness without a sound.

Tenchi stood there watching stillness for nearly a minute.

"You've surpassed my expectations, Tenchi." She tried and mostly failed to breach the ice she'd accumulated.

He breathed, then nearly laughed to think he might actually have had the energy to speak. A hopeful vision of Ryoko though, if only a ribbon, gave him enough to turn and wait for the lights leading to an exit. When they appeared before him, Washu stepped to his side, moving to escort him before he could be too startled.

"Get some rest if you can."

"You, too."

Overspent android to delirious ghost, they walked to the other side of the closet door.

"Tenchi?"

"Hm?"

"Ryoko loves you."

Tenchi faced the door diagonally, nearly forgetting which direction he was turning from. He closed his eyes and nodded as slow and certain as frightened could be.

"And so do I."

All the reassurances she might have added came as she cradled the back of his head and pulled him for a tighter embrace. He believed it, and returned it. She held him by the elbows then, at arm's length, looking into his chest.

"And in her own way, so does Aeka."

Washu turned and walked, leaving him and his even more desiccated face imitating an outstretched hand.

"Do what you have to, Tenchi.....do what you think is right.....but don't tell her about our pact. It-"

She stopped walking for a moment then continued on with precise confidence.

"It would not help us; and there's no need to risk anything more."

000

"You went to her then?"

"Yes."

"And you could not help her?"

"No---n-that is, not the way I hoped."

It had been dark outside when he emerged from the lab. Late in the evening, early in the morning, he tried not to remember the last time he'd gone a day without rest. Maneuvering to avoid the direction of every clock in the house, he noticed Aeka sitting on the couch almost instantly. No television. No book. She'd offered a walk in such a delicate voice that she might as well have been expecting a lecture. From him, of all people.

His thoughts lilted in the breeze, only scratching in sand against the tide of Aeka's radiance to restrained agony.

That numb exchange passed in the first steps from their home. They were halfway to the lake before he heard her breathe again. Now the hesitation was killing him, they'd already started off speaking distantly and that was bad enough. Childish hopes crawled in that the pain in his chest had to be two, that one might smother the other, but they only ever stopped to refuel when he glanced over. She kept watch over the ground in front of them for longer than Tenchi could take as a blessing.

Their first steps onto the dock reminded him, unmercifully, of dreaming, the dream itself as certain. Drained of what it took to roar or weep, he felt certain that his skin would simply crumble away in its stead. Slightly more than half empty, the moon lay against the water, waiting or resigning. Aeka stopped walking only a few steps from land.

"This time that you've been gone.....I've tried to accept that I should not ask of Washu's plans, I've even tried not to wonder if---if she has any."

Tenchi prepared the look of disbelief intended for her, but only managed to apply it to the lake, to the wood beneath them.

000

The artless metallic office, as much like a bomb shelter as a workspace, was so sterilized of sound that the nail clippers would surely have echoed were echoes allowed. Seita sat back in an office chair, reclining toward the first inch of affectation, while Washu leaned forward, hands closed into each other and resting on her desk. Complete patience came as an easy formality after maintaining an expectant stare so complete.

"I will say first that I do not expect you to explain the motives of your decision."

She frowned slightly, waiting for a reaction on the symmetry of expectations, desires, and plans, waiting for swift violence. She prepared herself to be worn down by a slight of hand from the corner of his mouth.

He'd finished the remaining fingers before she accepted that he had no response. Having collected the trimmings in one hand, he rechecked the work on his other. It was enough like stalling or avoidance to mean he'd need more before he could consider a direct response. Washu casually sat up and brought a small wastebasket, holding it out to him as mundanely as she could without being rude. He looked up, but only at the container and the few spaces above it. She watched his hands brush each other clean with a touch or waste of elegance. The tension spread through her, wild and uncoordinated enough to purge in small time.

"All that machinery---" his familiarly smooth voice, though its confidence seemed fused with despair, stopped her halfway back to her desk. She lifted her head to imply that she'd paused only to give him immediate recognition, only for his sake, rather than her throat's.

"None of them suspected." A living, bleeding statement, but a halfhearted imitation of a statement-question.

Washu remembered and knew the scenery leading from the sub-elevator to her detached workstation.

If he was right then she'd achieved her objective, even in the face of carelessly testing Yosho's trust, and her own capacity to deceive without dishonesty.

If Seita was right then she would allow herself even less than whatever his satisfaction.

Washu moved to set the wastebasket down.

"This family is made of trusting people."

Less than an accidental show of affectation, the child-sized genius retook her seat, awaited and regained his attention.

000

"Do you intend to try again?"

He knew how much it hurt to hear such a joyless voice remain sweet and delicate, and he knew how desperately he wanted her not to ask questions she knew the answers to. If he had absolutely no idea yet how to measure it, he understood even less the desire for her to call him 'Lord Tenchi' again.

"Yes."

He imagined this was how a prisoner robbed of rest and enriched with truth serum would sound. It was undoubtedly how they would feel.

"Tenchi."

Aeka bowed her head a little lower, then brought it all the way up to face the entire waiting lake.

"You know I've offered my heart to you already, did you expect me to offer my assistance?"

000

Washu tried again to look, expecting the test to remind her that she and Tenchi were both worthy, both free. She began to wish Seita back into the restraints, never believing it would help her look directly at him, though his torso told her clearly enough that he was attempting no intimidation and only a faint pulse of dignity, human dignity at that. The search for guilt in her tactics failed again to distract their shame; she'd been as uncertain as Tenchi during the entire ordeal, horrifyingly uncertain from the moment Seita had opened survived eyes to her. However successful the test had been, that was all there could be now, no questions, only tests. She needed her love for her daughter to inspire her on, and she needed to be heartless to face the task ahead.

Vengeance had died in her hands, but the corpse was too heavy and septic to move. It would continue to rot where it was, wherever she was. And time frightened her as she did not remember. There would have to be another risk, another test, chance for chance that hope could be their fate. She could not cry, not plea, not rethink that transfer debt. But if she could imagine the cruelest part of Tenchi, then she could lift her eyes back into Seita's with the power of suppressed ambitions that felt like memories.

"You are no longer a psychologist."

Some small waver in his restrained blankness, possibly only physical; yet he could not be allowed to back down now. Washu followed up with a stronger injection of the same doctor's promise.

"And this is not reverse-psychology."

His breathing became more pronounced, more rapid, his eyes gaining color and commanding her to advance.

"But if you think you know my intentions, then by all means."

Washu sat back in her chair, folded her arms, and let out her breath on a weightless ribbon.

Seita remembered the first signs of his glare and titled grin but made no effort to fully hide more fear than he could contain. As expected, he lowered his head before he spoke.

"I found it odd.....that you proclaimed such confidence in Tenchi, yet were willing to let him give up so quickly."

000

"Aeka, I don't want _anything_ from you, I-"

The First Princess tried to gradually deflect the weight on her brow down, and away.

Tenchi closed his eyes into his throat.

"That's not what I meant."

"It was....."

Had he fallen from a plain to the ground the pressures matching each other in his throat and stomach would have glared, unimpressed. Tenchi began to reach for her, ready to throw his arms around her and crush the world back to that moment on the porch, that moment which could be what he'd tried to make it if he just fought hard enough, if he just forced till the weight killed him.

The film of Ryoko's despair throbbed on his palms.

"It was hard for me to imagine giving it."

"What?"

"How.....how could anyone help her more than you?"

Tenchi's level of pain, ready to reach entirety faster than any before, was distracted by a reflection, an obvious tilt in her voice; Aeka was hiding some part of her sincerity.

If he could only hold her.

"Aeka."

His hands ready.

"Please try to understand."

And he remembered that holding all his love to someone could still fail.

When Aeka turned to look at him, to bear her bitterest tears and deepest need, he was staring down at nothing, his eyes taken back into distant eyes.

000

"If I ever believed, even by force, that he could reach her, then I did."

Washu did not allow her eyes to darken, but she could feel her entire face begin to quiver.

"When I no longer believed---that _I_ could reach her---"

Seita's joyless insight waited not a moment longer than necessary.

"Your first thoughts were not of him."

Again, he remembered and feared himself with dying restraint. Washu bit a tiny portion of her lip and nearly smiled, no longer fearing how her disbelief in fate would serve in a battle against it. She blinked to reassure the dryness of her eyes, and ventured back into the waning cracks on the gate over the abyss.

"No, but my deepest hope still is."

His will, unspeakable and misplaced in all aspects of existence, gathered itself and stared back. What there was of fear and what there could be of malevolence flashed a challenging wall. He lowered his head again, the seed of doubt ceremoniously planted, and shared.

000

"No Tenchi, there is nothing left."

Her voice crawled into his consciousness, ice brambles, charred pins, dragging him away by the tendons. Tenchi's pained disbelief shattered the bearings in his eyes. They began to waver and dart about like the panic of a small animal with a freshly broken back.

"I can not allow you to continue after a hopeless cause."

He'd known in moments and felt in less how well she also understood; this went back, through, and beyond any references to her own emotional pursuits.

Tenchi looked at her as closely as he could. With a posture that froze diplomacy and mimicked Washu's own approach to all things prisoner, Aeka hid her hands together beneath the sleeves of her robe, her eyes beneath the shadow of her hair, and the soul of her breath behind a thin iron line.

**This is it.**

No longer trapped between opposing tidal waves, he was perilously balanced on the intertwined roots of two dying trees, the water to sustain them quivering in his core, a promise more evident than counted rings that life for one would mean death to the other.

**I have to tell her, even if I can't make her understand.**

And as more and thus, there a threat that abandonment would wail up into all shadows cast by the new life. The decay of the one would spread into and poison the other.

**---But tell her that there is one last chance, that you and her can be together if Ryoko-**

The demon spoke his name and he opened his mouth to answer or give back the soul that belonged in her voice, he did this as he knew he might and would for the rest of his days.

**Abandon one to lie to the other? Is that my only choice?**

The tear became trapped in the corner of his nose, he closed his eyes, moved to wipe it, and nearly bit his hand.

**No. **

He stepped toward Aeka.

**But I have to embrace her, I have to try to love her too, as much as I can.**

"I beg you," Aeka tore back the flesh beneath her nails to dig out and offer up the last of life's strength. Every part of Tenchi stopped.

"Leave her where she belongs."

He widened his eyes in disbelief, such an impassioned voice traded in for the strength of the dead.

000

"So then." Washu let her breath die in her hands and rose from her seat.

Seita held his position against the shadow of her.

"As I was saying," She watched every inch of the chair as she pushed it back into the desk, but waited for his attention unflinchingly as she spread her hand over holo-keys. Half the sound sheet metal makes before it touches thunder, but Seita made an effort not to notice the room's disassembly.

"You are no longer a psychologist."

The bottom of a canyon, bathed in the light of technological mountains, the elevator that was umbilical cord retracted into the ceiling like a mollusk's eye, passing a height where the sharpest could see only blackness.

"This is not reverse psychology."

Washu stepped towards him, hands behind her back, eyes reaching down before the pit was yet uncovered. She stood still, in easy range, as the last of her office disappeared with a dull thud.

"But your access to the mind is unmatched in the universe."

Seita lifted his head, but only enough to rest his mouth and face against his intertwined fingers. The decision, final and difficult, evaporated into higher forms behind closed eyes, before a vivid and unmerciful gaze that climbed back up the offering of Washu's hope.

Looking into his knuckles as he lifted his head, looking into his fingertips as they tested the space between them.

"If you don't mind," the guest intoned as he had, as he remembered his beginning.

Washu watched his fingertips connect, the pyramid closing like a bud, her eyes following, now with more certainty than the all she had hoped for.

"I'll find my own route."

000

If Tenchi had ever tried to imagine the cruelest part of himself, it had been an ordeal shorter even than the necessary insanity of trying to imagine the most human part of Seita. This time was no different, save to know that the time spent before had always been enough.

He felt his hands clench at his sides, a year of exhaustion purging, inverting into force. Thoughts that needed no distance from their emotions, that slowed for no barrier, rolled out of his mouth in a heat haze, hushed for consuming both fog and dust.

"Aeka?! H-How can you say that?"

"Tenchi," she tried to order and failed to restrain her tears even more miserably, "that woman, even if she was your friend before-"

"Stop it."

He felt her mouth sag at the taste of metal in his own. It spread over his teeth, fortifying his jaw as densely as his eyes, even as first love looked inside, bleeding.

**No more. I can't fail now, I can't allow self-righteous cruelty, even if I have to swallow all of it myself.**

Aeka looked ready to back away, or to tip over like an imperfectly molded porcelain figure.

"T-T-Tenchi! What's wrong with you?"

"With me?" Tenchi felt it spread up from the ore crushed in his frown, a conqueror's marble gilding his mind's voice. "No."

**This has to end. **

000

Seita's sweat glistened bright, almost crystalline on his stubble-waned skin.

Washu did not expect his eyes to burst open, did not expect his teeth to bare for another minute or more.

She did not move, did not look away from the blood howling red on his neck, from the white warring on his knuckles and fingertips.

His chest had filled past what appeared natural, deflating only when it simply had to threaten an explosion.

Washu watched, arms crossed, eyes found precisely between skin and glass, eons away from fearing explosions.

000

"No, let's talk about what's wrong with Ryoko. That's the issue here. _That's_ the question killing _everyone_!"

Aeka's eyes stole away what little color remained in her cheeks.

"How we could have just let her disappear.....how _I_ could have cursed _her_ for abandoning us-"

000

Eyes crushed beneath Seita's brow, more so when he opened them. The glare was aimed at the floor, but Washu recognized this break, this acceptance of new tactics, as a sign of expected reversions.

His teeth were showing less now than when they'd threatened to break, and Washu could estimate just enough space left open for him to run his tongue between them. A slight squint and the wet pink of it became the white of soldiers' eyes. Drummers died against their skins, falling thin and round onto the earth.

Chaos and genius met their anticipated reaction, and everything it had become.

Seita did not show affectation, much less concern for the lack of apparent fear in her. He conceived a chuckle, growing sinister, living maniacal, till his fingers threatened to slide apart for the bellows of joyless triumph.

Washu watched as she had, from a former heart yet still a hand of triumph.

000

Tenchi wrapped the silence of the night around his throat, a tourniquet that yet allowed the poison to bleed out.

"Her mind was enslaved, for centuries she was forced to rob and murder countless people," the binding strangled him as he swallowed back his own reactions to the words, "and then she was imprisoned, entombed for centuries more."

Aeka brought a mortified sleeve up to her mouth, trembling the shell of a scream behind it. She made to turn away, but was halted.

"And then---what does she encounter when she's finally set free?"

"Tenchi, please." Aeka closed her eyes on a progressing flow, stepping back.

Her dream, host, and blood stepped forward.

"And on a shaky peace, she's taken by Kagato, then clay, and then-"

"Stop it!"

The holler that would have sent a thousand Jurains into flight, that should have brought the guardians, merely gave Tenchi the next moment's pause.

000

Seita stood, the office chair overturned beside him, elbows locked into his pelvis, hands receiving a star's fangs, pale upturned neck ready to bleed out the black of space. A blossom of shadows radiated around both him and his essentially unmoved audience. Yet the light was provided, as it had been, by the surrounding machinery rather than the white hole in existence suspended before him.

It moved less than Washu at the meeting between his collarbones, where it might have lodged had he swallowed it, as he could have, like a small coin or large pill.

Minutes had passed, and minutes more till his breathing began to level, though still more than adequate to sustain a long run as a competitor.

000

"Why her, Aeka? Why not any one of us?"

Aeka continued to sob into her masking sleeves, seemingly oblivious, while Tenchi finally began to drain at the sound and sense of his own opened voice.

"If it _is_ because of all she's been through, would that take our excuse?"

No movement once he closed the distance between them.

He remembered the last they'd been so close, and did not fight it. Ryoko, Ryoko & Himself followed, unquestioned, complete and agonizing, and he let all of it embrace him, leave him afloat with not but the vision to see across seas and worlds.

"And if not, can you say it's because you're the better---"

The plea, if not the apology, came crawling across the loss of his stern tone and the rest.

"I'm not going back to prove any of that."

"Tenchi," she groaned through sobs, "You don't understand."

"Aeka-"

The princess leapt more than fell to her knees and Tenchi's feet, holding her hands above her head, a complete plea of royalty speaking for all the worlds she'd populated with the most sacred of her desires.

"Please, Tenchi! You can't---You don't know what she-"

Hysteria drained of its chaos and its empathy will fit between the skin, into reserves of compassion held only for the all, and held well.

"I love her."

---

"You knew."

"As did you."

Glaring over the opening, Seita and Washu exchanged the unspoken desperation to be rid of all that had made them, and or to then be rid of all that made them.

Seita's hands began to lower, his eyes to follow his face, far from a sulking reverence, he looked right into the eye of oblivion as it shrank to a pin. He tensed only slightly as it drove back into himself. Threat and reassurance embraced mechanically.

"It could have taken decades, but I might have returned."

"And you have."

He turned and improved his posture with a few gazes up into Unmatched Science's latest Leviathan. Washu took one step, holding her hand out in the same clockwork movement.

"Shall we then?" Seita looked down and to the side, listening to the highest concentration of what soul remained, listening to it imitate a robot. "Let each other help each other?"

"No." Solemn and vulnerable, he spoke to himself, listened to himself, turning back and into the only other thing he knew.

"Let us _help_ Tenchi."

Skin like real skin, his promise of mortality nothing, but nothing like the threat of unwanted life. Washu let his hand go before either of them began to shake, and walked back toward the desk, into the thought of Ryoko. The first tears given full permission were slowed by the needed reassurance that helping the one meant saving the other.


	6. Verse Fifteen is Sanctuary and Asylum

Standard Disclaimer:

I thank all the owners of the Tenchi characters who have chosen not to sue me for suggesting some alternative uses for them.

Standard Advertisement:

I thank all the readers who have perused my other submissions and favorite authors.

Standard Procedure:

Remain calm. Speak clearly. Retrace steps.

000

Tenchi Muyo: Sanctuary and Asylum 

_No love is lost for reason---while justifying ends._

_Thought retains but an image---of all emotion condemns._

_-ZJS_

000

The stars about him were not the stars overhead, and hours before his short respite the same had been as true. In travel or in observance, the light to see inside the dark was not mortal, was not merciful, was not the light to see around it. His first attempt so close to the last chance, it would be easy to mistake desperation for bravery, stars for gems. He'd watched dying fires and forgeries revealed, a warmed calm to be living naked within, every fear was retreat was avoidance was over. Watching Aeka walk away, her first steps his last chances and his first surrenders, afterwards he could feel the silence mourn the last of certainty, the first crack on the weight. More stars above him through those moments on his earth than all he'd passed on route to his world.

Tenchi rode the automatic ship to Ryoko's prison, remembering Aeka's last words to him, how she looked ready to remain at his feet, silent and all but lifeless. He'd waited for the consequences of his words on all fronts, still waiting as she rose and moved to leave him there.

**"You've forgotten already, Tenchi---that _no one_ can love you as I do."**

And if she'd been ready and willing to impale him on fire then, her words brought only cold. He'd considered trying to explain a projection that was not based on return, realizing then that there had been no imagining it before.

She'd stood there, eyes hidden, then offered.

**"And it seems I was right to fear the difficulty I had holding hope for her, while holding it for us as well."**

Indifference had made its chrysalis from both their selves, tearing out, holding up its wings, its body now a crack down the center of a mirror. He'd seen his solitude and remembered his freedom, while Aeka had foreseen her death.

Her form had been flawless as she turned, hesitating once more, letting doubt become as failure, failure become as certainty as certainly as failure lived in reassurance.

**"When next you go to her, I shall return to Jurai."**

The stars had finally kept at least one promise, taken one option, erased a path with a death so strained it muted itself.

And it had been so real, so warm and calming. He'd waited for tears, then thoughts, then at last for sleep.

No dreams came.

No time for ceremony this morning, no last look at their ally or their chances.

Tenchi had left his home before any others had met the dawn.

And it was, he smiled unconsciously, a sundown when he arrived where he needed.

000

One sister tried to remember patience among the other things her remaining sister had suggested. Her elegant domain and servants could wait on her for time on end, but they could only remember their place.

She thought on champions, their eyes and wills. Each threat that rose, each power that blossomed, her fairer sister favored still.

To have forgotten more than denied her ignorance of all that came before, it intensified the distance.

A fallen champion left unmourned.

She wrapped each strength of her consciousness around this concept, constricting, absorbing. With hate and dreams she felt her distance, holding a single memory up to the light.

In this universe, and every other, there was no named terror greater than herself. And in her lone universe, she'd been invaded by the only mind that might have made a champion without needing to first be made.

The blue of oblivion, she remembered as she honored the agreement not to affect their center sister's actions.

That voice still blew serene winds through the most beautiful trees ever to grow in her mind's eye.

**"We must not show our hands, less we betray our faith in our sister, and her own."**

She remembered, as she did her own portion of the pact.

**"And thus, should he fail her, should he succeed himself, we must not bow our heads."**

She remembered, as she did that gaze into the sensuality of oblivion.

**"Since you are more afraid of losing yourself to him than you are of giving yourself back to us, I trust, as I must, that you will remember patience." **

She looked down at defiance of small rules, a gathering of objects all occupying the same space, each made or saved for a special occasion. Without joy, save for the will to have it, she echoed her reply.

"I will remember my self."

Thus true if uncomforted by her word, as she remembered gazing into Seita's eyes once, and never since.

"And my place."

000

Yosho stood at the top of the shrine steps and watched Ryo-oh lift into the clouds, wincing, then shielding his eyes from the late morning sun. Sasami's muffled sobs still tore from his office, through Mihoshi's lap, and over his shoulders like a steady mist.

Aeka had given all she had left to convince the younger princess that it was a sudden, yet easily solved matter on Jurai.

Washu, however, had nothing.

She'd appeared, as from nowhere, behind an only slightly tearful Sasami.

She'd asked the first princess, told her, that she did not have to go.

Aeka had managed something about being a better judge of Jurai's affairs, and had been mere seconds from the beam to her ship when some desperation or suppression had released.

The word 'hypocrisy' sounded out of place, too rhetorical, more so for the deadness in Washu's voice.

And there, in front of her sister and most of her extended family, Aeka had declared the scientist unwelcome on Jurai.

Still in his young form, knowing she was still in her 'small' form, Yosho watched the highest parts of her hair ascend the stairs. He wondered if he'd ever voice how the last of his capacity to see a child had died this morning. She kept her eyes on the steps, on the stones, till she reached his side and turned to watch an indiscernible mark travel against clouds too wispy to read shapes.

There was doubt, and mistrust now, snapping and roaring to stay afloat in a bog of pity.

He considered neither sound nor touch, could only stare into the sky, his hand beginning to feel like a beggar's crutch, his eyes falling down into her without moving.

He blinked and still saw the sky, still pictured her face, Aeka's, Ryoko's, his grandson unable to find any safe place between a boy and a knight.

The sea pulled him from the sky, without warning but without a start. From inside Washu's pocket a small recorder released an ocean wave that pulled itself back over a beach of small stones, each striking into another with a distinct part of the swarming clamor.

She kept her eyes from him as he watched her remove the small red crab, its toy plastic catching the sun. Small fingers carefully, reverently pushed one eye back into its shell. Millimeter by millimeter she pushed till the second stalk echoed the final click of the first, bringing the claws together in a swift lock that sounded less like plastic than the whole of a crystal cathedral, shrunken into a possessive hand.

"Washu," he felt his essence retreat back into himself, "what did you just do?"

His question, unique enough to him already, existed only in the now.

000

Tenchi crushed the indicator till he was sure its button had planted itself.

And he listened.

He'd readied himself for another bombardment of untouchable voices from those that had come before Ryoko, who might have been taken before language. Knowing better than to tempt overconfidence for having kept them out, he considered again that they had remained silent.

Knowing better than to gorge blind hope, he had also followed their example.

Ryoko had gained rings beneath her eyes and discoloration between her fingers, yellow into gray, sores into bruises into tattoos forced out by her bones. He'd closed his eyes on the first tears, wasting nothing to stop them or hold himself up. The floor alongside her received him, and he gathered her close. Then, lowering his forehead into hers, he'd cleared his mind of all but the weight and its crack, glowing if not yet expanding in her presence.

Now the indicator, unmoved by the red into white of his fingers, his eyes, simply bade him a better look.

The room was in the same state of empty, down to the wrinkles in her unused sheets, he'd no doubt.

The light was the same.

**What?**

And better before he'd finished blinking.

He heard, though the barrier of Ryoko's cell, through his own submitted focus, a soft whimper sent out like an exploding star through a wedding ring.

Not truly far at all, in the thick silence where the other inmates' minds had been, something older than Tsunami was crying out for its mother.

Tenchi released all pressure on his only contact with Washu, hardly feeling it reclaim shape as he lowered it to the ground. He pulled Ryoko's head into his chest with all the tenderness that weakness might afford.

All that she was to him poured from out his mind and into the back of his throat, where his breath carried it out on weightless ashes, unheard as he watched the eye of oblivion descend from the ceiling, no bigger than his own. Slower than a lost snowflake it fell, each corner of the room distorting to match this new center, to become the same lines were there only two dimensions, blurring any easy distinction between a dungeon and an auditorium.

Against the sterile turquoise monochrome, this void before purity cast no light, continuing its perfectly level fall till it stopped, to crown the average man, to sanctify a modest rooftop.

The wider it opened, the closer he pulled Ryoko, what sickly warmth still remained in her, Tenchi increased it till his hands strained. Oblivion held its yawn soon after, ready to receive the average moving truck.

White banners poured as much as billowed from the open pipeline, jellyfish that poisoned themselves opaque to make those few movements independent of the surf. An evenly hemmed corner inched towards Tenchi's foot, waiting for him to pinch and fold it back into clean shapes. Breezes that he could only see sent tiny waves across these fallen curtains and the corner lifted, pointing at them like a curious elephant before plunging down, turning the floor from dirty gray to as much pure white as would cover a street grate. The sheet, reflecting back on itself, mimicked the floor, absorbed black crosshatches, and in less time became a fine onyx-woven screen. The other sheets joined, then became it, till the single sail mimicked the sea the way an insect mimics affection. It stretched and bent, as if lifted up over high furniture to form a descending river.

And the river snaked down its mountainside, black screen flowing into a floor grate of perpetual ivory deformities.

Tenchi's eyes swam upstream by hopeless instinct and met the emerging bow of a small sweet cream gondola, its entire gilded mermaid's nest had melted into tented fingers, the smallest digits held out into dove's wings. It rose in a sluggish diagonal toward the ceiling, coming over a hill on the high side of oblivion.

_"Has the bluuue reign of apathy.....become the gold beyond all light?"_

The singer reached for the hearts of young girls and the throats of angels, a glamorous lullaby caressed up one side and down the other. Acoustics defied their room to bring every corner its own glorified part in pouring more glory, more immortality, more divinity upon whatever navigator emerged.

_"As du-a-lism's in-tox-i-cation.....births delirium's delight."_

Helpless inability to assume the siren, to hold Ryoko closer, Tenchi refused to feel the dry cracks rounding his eyes. 'Birth's had sounded like 'bursts', and he suspected this was no accident if any meaning.

_"Hoard the blood-warmed fruit-of-cen-ters.....sentimental tyranny invite."_

The craft, already emerged a coffin-length, still showed no occupant, no sign of tilting forward. It's voice grew no louder and ever more indulgent.

"_That the seeeas glass, and the wiiind peeeeearl....."_

Both hands held at the tip of the pole, head tilted atop them, rested against the dreamy descent in the last word, eased past all luxury, Seita lifted his perfect eyes and drank heaven, its dregs, its cup. A smile guided his nearly whispered croon directly into Tenchi's ear.

"_Call the sands of God 'Cold-Bright'."_

Having finished the deepest rivers of nothing, the pole lifted into existence, bending a rubber loop skyward, before its other end swung down past Tenchi's nose and straightened against the floor, white enough to be a run on oblivion's circle, a guiding line to the corners of the prison, conducting the introduction of a decadent waltz. Orchestras composing and progressing the memory of brass and diamond; wealth bowed its head to the fornication of electricity and all suns.

Seita moved the boat forward with a heavy stroke, bringing it crashing down into the net river, which reclaimed its gentle flow and confirmed its respectable size in the next moment. His song soured to awaken and command entire worlds.

_"COOOOLD Bright, our paaale stars---I-cons---O-ffer---NOT!"_

Every waver warble joined silver marble to the succulent ethers prostrating his throat.

Every thread of rhythm matched his rowing and flattered the flow of golden water in his hair.

_"SMOOOOTH Might, to jaaail fate---Ti-tans---Tow-ers---FOUGHT!"_

As he neared the center mark between overlord oblivion and huddled hope, the river bowed, the curtain staircase rising into a ribbon bridge. Tenchi blinked without noticing, then marveled that a violet storm could be painted so subtly into the vibrant eyes and inviting lips of a perfection so pale in its midnight kimono.

_"BRAAAAVE Bends, their maaartyr---He-roes---Re-wards---CAST!"_

Seita's head wove about to the words, making sure any watcher from every direction could believe they'd shared a glance. A measure of darkness rasped the back of his throat for the next line, the next row slower.

_"WAAAAR Torn, this iiinsight---Sym-bowl---Ban-ner---LAST!_

Letting the pole rest at a vertical, planting it where his podium might have been before his captive and helpless audience, he then swung an arm outward, caught and snaked through a heavy wind. Flamboyance ate the rest of fascism in that single gesture, spitting out the shells in the next moment. The orchestra began to settle, begging listeners to guess at a feint.

From his sleeve came the naked androginine body of Ayeka, bent, and swinging a weightless descent like a fallen leaf. When it glided back towards the boat its hands grasped and held frozen, by this time Seita's gesture was ready to come around for another, and it did, dropping Mihoshi, Washu, Ryoko, each holding their predecessor's ankles, forming steps shaped like a child's drawing of the ocean.

Tenchi's paralyzed horror managed to notice the space for two or three more steps before they reached the ground. By this time Seita was already descending, adjacent to them now, taking the steps without legs, the bottom of his kimono pulling him down like tilted mercury. He held the pole to give a tightrope balance its dream of being a show tune cane.

At the last step he specialized the gift of his profile, glancing over at Tenchi, bringing the orchestra to a complete silence by a gaze and tilted-grin. Sinister velvet would strangle, or make him forget his own name with but a second thought.

Seita granted sapphire down, curious, amused, moving from the Ryoko in Tenchi's arms to the Ryoko at his feet, and back into Tenchi's nearly competing pale. The grin rose again, and more, commanding he wonder if it meant an observance of who was last, or of who was next.

Rather than make any true guess possible, he lifted and half-spun the pole over his head, impaling the floor below him, again perfectly level, even when he removed both hands to comb his hair from the scalp out, to smooth his lapels. Eyes closed, face raised in forced ecstasy, he bent at the back, stretched at the arms, held tight, and raised his knee against the poll.

Almost as convincing a dancer as a singer, Seita spun an impossibly tight, slow, and perfect corkscrew to the floor. The coordinated rhythm of the song was more like hummed poetry now, strained to the bone for every last drop of sensual beauty in his voice.

_"Cold-bright---The-weapon---Your mind-ripe invention-"_

His first two rounds pulled the end of the river, along with the grate that collected it, like cotton on a spool. By the time he neared the floor it's drain was steadying the pole.

"_The new-found pre-tension....." _

Seita stopped, perfectly balanced, a photo on a swing, feat still covered by what seemed a kimono tailored a meter taller. He breathed a kiss of perfume and lowered himself, the fabric following, till he was standing on his own two black-bound feet. Leaning against the pole like a lover's portrait, he crooned over fangs.

"_Is surrreeeender."_

The net failed its infinity, dragging the boat and its tunnel along with the river into the amorphous bars at Seita's feet. Swallowed away, a magician's handkerchief worn as a scarf, ignored by his lovely assistant, its bitter victory song drained the audience of their deepest sympathies.

"_Coooold bright, con-suuuumes life.....by a-ny---o-ther---name."_

Seita rested his head against the pole as a goodbye while the oblivion portal itself began to stretch and disappear like a thin cloth lid.

"_Whoooo might---nuuurse twice....."_

His glare sharpened to humble the essence of violence.

"_To bu-rry-all in fame?_" 

Rapid blinks up as at the first drops of rain, smiling utterly gentle and alone, he watched the pole descend slow and the grate shrink slower to join at his feet. The lullaby stole the air and froze the blood and begged that Tenchi's heart burst for better reasons.

_"Will the black-named ghost---hold it haunts---and bide its breaths till then?"_

"_Can a white-so-long been o-bli-vion-_" tall as a cane, cradled like a candle, Seita crouched with the last of the white, a coin on the tile, "_mean in-no-cence a-gain_?"

Balancing smoothly up onto his fingertips, folding his hands behind him as he stood, the approach was diagonal to the room, straight to his hosts. He kept his head low and thoughtful as he brought Tenchi back to that night in his room, the impossible power claiming transcendent insult on everything in existence. He sang to himself still and again.

_"Can a white so long been Oblivion-"_

Seita lifted his face as he stopped within striking distance, eyes inverting all that would be mortal in a god, showing Tenchi compassion and vanity; left to waste, made to rot.

"_---mean innocence again?"_

He blinked concisely, collected himself with a thin-lipped breath, and began walking, circling a thought around them.

"Well now, Tenchi," he taught an apprentice true subtlety in pretension, "you have what you need."

Staring blankly at Ryoko's still unmoved form, Tenchi crawled through a numbness to frighten death and faced the ghost made flesh made of the only knowledge to surpass madness. He was still observing their undeniable objective, and Tenchi saw such sculpted distance, such disgust, that when it lifted to confront him he let his mouth slack.

"But is _this_ what you want?"

000

Washu turned and walked away from Yosho, intent on his shrine office.

Halfway there she stopped in the same instant as Sasami's cries.

Tsunami's younger self slid the door aside and emerged onto the courtyard, a humble guest, a small young woman rather than a growing girl. No difference in body, no need with such a change in expression.

Fragile new science began to glance back, but Yosho remained fixed on the sky, oblivious to them as he could not possibly be. Mihoshi was a statue in the office, or was nowhere.

The suspicion, its terror, all reflex, with no strength left to dismiss it or express it.

"She's afraid, even more afraid than I am."

Sasami's approach was steady, her voice even and serene save for the accepted fear, accepted, yet far from lessened.

"She says that both her sisters are too."

Washu realized, remembered, that the most innocent person in the family had grown slightly taller than her. Standing well within reach of each other now, she did nothing to affect the lone tear, the consequences, though it was surely and calmly revealing every aspect of secrecy in her life.

"She says they shouldn't be."

Washu embraced Sasami, slow as desperation, past sobs and into shivers.

Sasami returned the gesture, offering all the serenity she could for the few moments to spare. Before Washu might have considered escaping entirely, the young princess gently pushed her away, holding her shoulders.

Washu let the gaze enter her till it found what would push it back, what would fortify her even at the price of her. There was precious little left, but enough to resurrect the perception needed to read Sasami's face, as it became Sasami's face again, as their roles would soon need to be reversed.

Unmistakable unnamable, staring into the fear that does not die from acceptance, the moment before tears that believes itself the moment before final wisdom. The unflinching vulnerability that makes a strong self into strongest affection; Washu read the weakness in Sasami's bottom lip, all but heard it speak into her mind.

'I love you, but I hope you know what you're doing.'

000

The weight had been named, had been captured, and Tenchi felt it crack again in the presence of all that Seita would have made himself. He wondered if it was ready to be swept away, or finally absorbed into his blood.

Imposing, post-natural elegance had turned its back on them for a moment, folding its arms against perfect lungs. Tenchi could only throw the question back with muted disbelief. He had not looked for a single spark of healing in any of part of this witness, its entrance, and found nothing just the same. Allowed a moment to consider that the question had been directed at something other than the fading soul in his arms; he declined. He pressed his cheek against her and let the self-gratifying question answer itself.

Seita did not turn to face them, merely releasing a long silent breath to improve a sigh, letting his hair-flow compliment rather than continue to slightly defy gravity.

"What are you doing here, Tenchi?"

Crushed velvet billowed in a gentle arctic wind, every thread turning delicate and impossibly softer before it became glass. He began surveying the other side of the room as if it hid a mural of impossible detail.

"I'd understand if you were still too confused to answer, and yet I hope your are not too afraid to listen."

Tenchi listened to him turn and walk back toward them, looking up, almost too exhausted to fight and far too far to surrender, however deeper the malice would cut him this time.

Seita was quieted, the intensity in his eyes betraying calm, but the blankness in his face transcending peace.

"Because this time you _will_ listen, because this time I no longer have to deceive, or force you," Seita looked at his hands with marveled uncertainty, "for I am now even more bonded with oblivion than I was before seeking out your aid."

Self-importance outgrew its limitless wardrobe, reflected on the quiet of defeating every last opposition. Seita held out a hand to admire his nails.

"Existence is my child, and I do not love it, and I love it only so much as will flatter me."

He turned his hand over, crushed the last diamond in his clawed fist.

"And I have consumed, now embodied, the last and the whole of my place in it."

Seita angled a grin to make harlots holy.

"I understand the self I have made, the catalyst I have become, but before you can understand that, you must accept what it is you have brought here."

Again he looked at Ryoko, a quaint and unintentionally ironic piece of folk art, a well-worn comfort toy.

Seita began to pace and speak like a being desperate to savor the step it had passed over, had been denied, of existing as a mortal who was more than any.

"That's right Tenchi, look at her. Look at her and remember, try to form some critical perspective. This woman isn't here as some agitating activist, she's here because she willfully attacked the Galaxy Police.

"There isn't any corrupt puppet master to blame this time. She may look like she's been victimized, but you know as well as I do that she hasn't 'lost' her mind---"

Tenchi began to shiver for the bitterness that washed over him as Seita turned, now keeping his glance over them as the rest of his form paced.

"She's _given it up_."

And the overindulged rasp was gone in the next moment, having passed its crown.

"She was looking for sanctuary at the shrine, on that day your grandfather shared in my perception."

Tenchi noticed him pause for reaction, pleased with no reaction more than exhausted bewilderment.

"She was looking for release when she put her sword to Aeka's throat," he smiled up at the ceiling, down into Tenchi's horror, "much more convincingly than yourself, if I may say so."

He hardened his face in a violent strike, relishing the death of his affected amusement.

"She was looking for _anything_ when you came to her in the cave."

The gait in his pacing increased while the speed subsided.

"She is content to be all but inexistent, to withdraw till she is forgotten."

There before them he stopped, bent anxiously over the pyramid of his hands.

"But you are willing to claim 'all the love in the universe' to stop her.....you are _unwilling_ to allow her."

He leaned back, comfortably enthroning himself on the air, crossing one leg over another, glaring vividly over his fingers.

"Now Tenchi, let me tell you what 'all the love in the universe' adds up to."

Seita blinked slowly, shaping, honing emotion.

"I know this," he began in his plain voice, opening his eyes on all the pleasure taken from having life and mercy at once beneath him.

"Because I've _seen_ this!"

Tenchi closed his eyes as well, opening them when he believed he could look only at Ryoko. He saw more, and heard everything.

"Imagine you could witness the entire dimension of affection, all that might be called the highest emotion, spread out for your approval. There still, there again and again, in multitudes behind every joy of every length, are the _wretches_, making themselves sicker for every nurse that passes them."

A brief collage of human misery flashed over Tenchi's mind, glazing the weight.

"What ress_spite _do they deserve," every vein in Seita's face, flowing powder into steam, "putrid, vacant, weakling carbuncles, how many flawless angels would it take to convince the rest of the _un_-wasted universe that they really were just 'hiding beautiful souls'.

Head tilting to the side, he subtly pursed his bottom lip, soon matching it with an avalanche of his brow.

"And here! And again!" One half then of the pyramid followed the other, reaching to hold and to ravage.

"The _farce_-hope we give them---to pacify their revelation tantrums."

Seita stood and turned with a small flail of his kimono, pacing perception's posture back under control with a calculated breath. His voice, however, pushed farther past the whole of bitterness.

"They deserve no 'kind sacrifice'. They deserve no 'hidden talent'. They don't even deserve _convincing_ dolls!"

Hands on his hips, elbows bent like folded wings, he elegantly squared his back and shoulders to them, cooling his volume, sharpening his tone.

He walked, and injected himself into Tenchi's eyes.

"That _ugliness_, born out of sloth, born out of stupidity.....they deserve _NOTHING_.....but the 'unique' moments.....and lifetimes they spend---in miserable, crippling---_loneliness_."

"It is therefore more just," the joining of hatred and vulnerable sincerity swelled to fold his arms behind his back, "more humane, that they receive, and surrender, to my consuming illusions," he glared down into Tenchi's face but saw every enraging detail of the two huddled forms, "than to your empty promise."

He slowly pulled his eyes over into the entirety of Ryoko's form, even softer gauze pinched slivering broken glass, reflecting the self-conscious absence of blood in the wisdom he spoke to himself.

"The fear of such rightly place solitude---it is the sharpest and deepest in all social beings, and more than enough in many others."

Seita swung his eyes back into Tenchi's to hold his throat with thin, unbreakable hands.

"And its consort, its faithful, enduring partner, its 'soul mate'-"

He crouched down, Tenchi clenched his teeth against the beginnings of a rattle. With a tenderly extended hand, and eyes lowered again, somewhere around Ryoko's self, he smoothed aside a lock of hair from her cheek using a decorative nail rather than his palm.

"The coveting of a known counterfeit---that one cannot afford."

Their eyes met, complete.

"_That_ is what you have here, Tenchi. I've seen toddling children form equally desperate bonds with their 'practice' toys."

The shade of a sneer began to crack through some edges, was quickly banished by all seriousness.

"In the context of all you've done to bring us _here_---to _her_---how to begin?" A few strands of his song blew past, complicating the use of 'us'.

Seita stood and returned to the seat he'd made for himself, re-assimilating the excessive sensuality, the mock-enticement twice jeered-on the content of his address.

"To the scribes of countless galaxies, you've taken what could have been the undying if still unoriginal affections of the most powerful royal family---and put it up against---then finally _behind_---your 'concern' for a catatonic space pirate.

He stretched his legs till his torso was boneless, then stretched again, soon pulling apart like taffy. The top half glided seamlessly onto Ryoko's bed, re-growing the bottom at the same pace that the original sank into the floor.

"And now."

He hugged himself, running his hands through fabled hair, stretching hands together above his head, an overpaid courtesan rising to meet whatever time might care. When he reached the end of his angles he let himself flop lazily against the single cushion.

"You've given oblivion back its ghost."

Delirious, effeminate luxury, Seita closed his eyes and smiled.

"You've risked the sanity---of every universe and the very existence of more."

Tenchi noticed a growing weakness in his arms, a tightening in his throat.

"No, I wouldn't be surprised if you believed you loved Ryoko more than-"

Seita dangled out his hand and fingers condescendingly.

"Than whatever the last 'most important thing' was."

Both hands returned to his hair.

"But I simply can't, in good conscience, let you make an uninformed decision."

Every nuance challenged, then overpowered the base danger of the uncaring, the death pure allure of the unknown. Tenchi forced himself to breath, force the weight to crack again, just a little more, just to cause enough pain to spur some counterattack.

He could feel the despair traveling from Ryoko, into his hands, rushing to meet the place where Seita's words were real.

And Seita's words were real, gathered and nurtured for more than time. He rose and walked toward them, past them, to the opposite wall.

"I have seen the edge of existence, known it for what it is: an ever-growing, and folding concoction, placed arbitrarily on an _infinite_ petri dish.

"There are countless blossoming civilizations, and uncountable sentient energies, hiding as they will. Many of these are around stars that will die trillions of years before their lights reach each other."

He turned and leaned against the wall, satisfied thus far, or perhaps exhausted more than Tenchi could guess.

"And among all those that still dwell on the possible existence of a force that can bind two entities together---with complete and unbreakable permanence.....the same conclusions are readily apparent."

Hands behind him, the insight stroll, Seita looked for the glee in justly executing the most persistent of delusions, and found himself inside it.

"This 'love', for all I've seen, rises up and consumes the consciousness of beings who are both exceedingly self-indulgent, yet ironically terrified of solitude. The desire for it, and more so the desire to receive it, can in some cases even surpass the desire to survive. A further irony is that it's the basest carnal instinct, to find shelter and perpetuate the species, that drives it. Granted, some fascinating things have come to pass for the sake of proving its power above power."

Seita's eyes narrowed, thinned, cut.

"Where there's a will there's a way, even a destination, but not an origin.

"Works of art attempting to honor this idea could fill dimensions; the emotions they can inspire are undeniable, as are the revenues they can generate. What is overlooked though, is the destructive outcome of socially conditioning a being to seek something on an intangible infinite level that they can hardly find on an adequately physical level."

"Emotional attachments, instinctive ones between parents and children, and those developed between mates, are often beneficial to survival, but they do _not_ 'transcend', much less overshadow the ever-changing needs and capacities of mortal biomes."

Seita paused just long enough for Tenchi to hear his name mutter faintly across Ryoko's desiccated lips. The cracks in the weight had been adding on all the while. If it mattered, Tenchi couldn't ask, couldn't know if he wanted to. His guide read on from a journal he'd planned to bury, still determined to be remembered admirably for it.

"Whatever drives you towards this alluring ideal of permanent attachments; permanence does not exist, even in oblivion, where space can eventually grow over any chosen point. Even when someone does 'stay' with a mate for the remainder of their lifetime, as do a number of non-sentient organisms, this is usually to avoid the difficulty surrounding replacement. Often enough it is for the self-empowering rush of exercising the will to gratify the emotion, to further indulge the fantasy of permanence."

Seita spoke to Tenchi, person to person, dead to earth.

"_That _is what holds you to Ryoko now. But as strong as it may seem in this moment, any number of things could gradually wear it down, or snap it off, depending _only_ on how much you _want_ it to be real."

Tenchi looked up and into Seita's eyes, alive as possible, though he bent to sit back on the throne, this time betraying a weariness that might keep him there for a longer verse.

"This easily observed, yet often ignored fact.....perhaps 'ignored' isn't the proper word, no, 'demonized' is much more fitting."

Tenchi remembered the van, the entrance and litany up till recently, how the believable defeat and undeniable ambition refused to coexist. He realized then, that he'd listened, taken in everything, that it was working its way inside the weight's core.

Unaffected, the warmth remaining in Ryoko, however much had been his, would not let him strike back just yet.

"For reasons I'd rather not risk explaining again, I've spent quite a bit of time and effort making _the_ villain of myself. It is therefore almost past cliché and back again that I should speak of love in this way."

Tenchi felt the perception projection enter deeper into him like the tightening of a warm blanket. Seita was balancing chin in hand, elbow on wrist, thinking on his knees, but the caress of his hand inside the young man's mind was merciless and irresistible. There was no pity, merely a sense of injustice that would frighten the depths of sadism.

"The arrogant, the greedy, the cruel, they are portrayed time and time again as denying love, only to find that the drive toward this fantasy is more powerful than the drive for tangible wealth or power."

He spoke into Tenchi's mind, though he mouthed the words, portrayed the solemn path to final wisdom.

"This is no surprise, as the rejection of unbreakable attachments often entails the rejection of attachments altogether, thus the inevitable decay of organisms adapted to be social."

A small, and encompassing frown; Seita leaned forward, elbows on his knees, chin on his knuckles. He tried as much as he could without force, to do justice to the memory of sincerity.

"On a baser level: _I_ must have been romantically rejected one too many times, or perhaps I had to endure the loss of someone I'd spent ages with, convincing myself of a 'shared soul'."

Seita's lips shrank towards a pucker then slid back into a small grin. One eyebrow titled slightly with his head as he reattached a thin strip of velvet round his throat.

"I must be just another cynic, out to poison the flowers no one will give him."

Tenchi closed his eyes and let his face lower away. He listened still, the stare that accompanied the words never leaving his vision, as they knew it wouldn't.

"Maybe I should have just waited for someone who could see that 'beauty was only---to finally love me for who I-'" sarcasm died on revolution's sword, Tenchi saw as much as imagined Seita's hair fall and paint melt, saw luxurious black turn to sickly white.

"To make me forget the inevitable, the necessary figure, who would seek self destruction as long as possible before the deepest meaning revealed---that extravagance is merely the death throws of purely expressed emotion, that emotion as currency, as creative weaponry, invites the pre-chaos, the draining return to oblivion.....this effect of every emotion needing material to rouse interest."

Seita rose, all but hugging himself, victorious over pity, eager to serve under the void, with all material emotion wielded in his eyes.

"I_ really am_---trying to help you, Tenchi." A breath of frustrated sincerity, and he hid his eyes, opening them again on Ryoko, unforgiving.

"I'm giving you the final truth, I'm only showing you your chances. If you have the strength of will, if you have the power of perception, you can pull yourself away from this---this idea that you're obliged, compelled by some ultimate candy heart beyond the stars---to sacrifice everything for one unreliable woman."

The weight reached its limits. Tenchi could feel it in the tips of his digits, clinging to every fiber of his thoughts. It actually felt like he was getting lighter, or rather emptier, the blood and bones draining out through his unblinking eyes.

When enough physical reflex built up for him to blink, a drop of exhausted water wailed down at the realization that he was on the brink of joining Ryoko, letting his mind fall to take the pain with it.

He thought about smoothing a little more of Ryoko's hair, kissing her cheek, and telling her that he was sorry, that he loved her. The weight in stones, boulders, in planets and stars, it was cold till he at last yielded to hold it to him.

And in his arms was nothing but Ryoko.

Tenchi's eyes cranked open on rusted gears, bits of iron decay flaking off. It took effort just to do this, enough effort to make him remember basic physical pain, the kind his grandfather had taught him with, to make him work harder, to focus his anger out, and away. There was so much that he hardly thought and hardly missed violence or shouts or more than one more tear.

"You were never really planning to help us, were you?"

Seita tilted with a heavy, uncertain frown, staring at the sound of a stern voice claiming as much strength as it would need. Tenchi looked right back up and spoke again before the painted lip could finish planning its curl.

"You've never _really_ wanted to help anyone. Whatever's really in your head, it isn't other people."

Seita crinkled a fraction of his nose and raised a little more of his eyebrow. Tenchi blinked without the thought of intimidation and looked down at Ryoko, smoothing her hair while his eyes watered again.

"I cared about her enough not to kill you, then to actually trust you inside her head," Tenchi swallowed and cut the salt on his cheek with the copper in his throat, "after everything you've done---that _has_ to count for something."

Another gulp, larger for closed eyes, made his head shiver to endure some horrid taste that had just become bearable. He let memories of Ryoko pass over him, and for the first time in eons, he gave them free reign.

"But I guess it was pretty stupid to believe in you, and maybe I'm pretty stupid to believe I love Ryoko this much," his legs were pitiful by arthritic old dog standards, but he managed to lift Ryoko up and hold her securely while staring oblivion in the eye, "but I don't care. If you're not going to help her then I'll just have to take her home myself."

Seita closed his eyes and breathed in all the air in the room, Tenchi felt the right time to shout.

"And I don't care if it doesn't last forever, I don't even care if one of us cares more or less about the other!" The strength fell carelessly out of his throat in one thick sob, but held tight to all the defiance he could remember.

"I _know_ what I feel---and I know I want to help her any way I can, that's all."

Tenchi lowered his eyes under Seita's chin, ready for the blue to take them both; it began to square for all the pressure he was putting on his jaw. The door was just a few steps beyond their weapon, and he brushed a little bit of Ryoko's hair through a kimono sleeve as it flickered almost too rapidly to see. Tenchi was trying to balance Ryoko on his knee while he reached for the pass card in his pocket. His arm's threats to fall off were obviously idle.

He had forgotten the sensation of oblivion already, and as it opened behind him he turned despite his new attempts at certainty.

Seita cradled the empty circle in his hands, a delicate saucer levitating millimeters from his fingers.

Tenchi watched the designing in his face, a search for the most impressive way to describe, or embrace gracious defeat. Seita was stirring cement with the breaststroke.

"Alright Tenchi, don't say.....anything."

When the 'normal' voice felt sorry enough for itself it found the greatest guise of gentle, and when it rose up again, trying to sound sure enough for everyone, it remembered wise.

"Trust as you will," Seita let Tenchi see what he'd hoped for, let oblivion see it as well.

"And feel as you must."

000

The Ghost of Madness looked down from his sanctuary and into their asylum, nursing the memory of a procedure and re-visiting the theory that had inspired it, the first and last attempts and their success.

As theories come and go, it had usually struck his colleagues as flirting, fleeting, and by association flattering.

If they could have seen him then and now, proving to no one but himself, that the physical abnormalities found in the brains of mentally disturbed persons were usually the _cause_ of their disorder, but were not always the origin.

If he remained relaxed and removed, the dream manipulations would end as he finished them.

However, if he spent the energy to focus, to merge enough of his controlled perception into theirs, they would wake feeling oddly refreshed and would show considerably greater cognitive health.

That temporary link, relaxing the electricity in their brains as much as his atoms relaxed in the presence of anything like an attack; this could happen to the point of sharing memories, and more importantly: energies, transferred back and forth as if within the same system

But he never took in any bad dreams, or even destructive fantasies. When such energy came to him, at him, his body would perceive it as a threat and let it pass through. Realizing this so long after his ambitions had realized him, he'd devised a mildly vulgar plan to 'cure' a particularly ill person, letting them know unimagined health for a short while before re-infecting them ten-fold.

Thus he'd focused one night on making the strongest connection yet, allowing the subject's psychic malady to flow freely into him, through him and into oblivion. He'd envisioned a clearing of crystal tunnels, tenderly drained of colorful obstructing lights. Within a day the patient and their family were overcome with surreal joy.

The doctor had been instantly and severely disciplined.

000

The mental equivalent of arched fingers rippled through the unending and trickled inside all that was left of Ryoko.

He forced himself, envisioning a bramble mass of luminous wires, bright purples and greens, all mutilating and screaming knots into each other. With thin arms spread wide, the Ghost of Madness embraced his tools. Straining, cursing, he pulled them into himself and left an un-choked garden.

Before the deciding moment, he'd thought the design beautiful, and been almost sorry to see it all go. On that deciding moment, Oblivion, Infinity, and Perfection Manifest, could think nothing and take nothing from its blank will to cast out the offending angel.

But he was too uncommonly distracted from himself to take much notice. Luckily, as fate would have it, as anyone would care to know, he was able to watch Ryoko move her hand onto the only face, and say its name the way she'd wanted her life. Their revelations better than declarations, the disorganized song of their connection sounded no worse as it was muffled, smeared, burst with no difference between tears, as they pressed their worn and exhausted faces together.

000

_How many fates turn around in the overtime?_

_Ballerinas have fins that you'll never find._

_You thought that you were the bomb. Yes, well so did I._

_Say you don't want it, again and again._

_But you don't, don't really mean it._

_You don't, don't really mean it._

-Tori Amos

(Excerpt) "Spark"

000

Washu stood on her toes and stretched into a yawn, her slender fingers tickling the pine needles. In the distance she could just see Sasami and Mihoshi teaching Ryo-ohki how to swim like a child with an inflatable carrot. The three pairs of laughter carried through the wind and leaned her into a tree with a smile hidden from time.

The footsteps on the dirt trail were slow and spacious; she listened just as intently to the happy sounds between them. A few birds were singing and the girls were shouting up a different game by the time they stopped behind her. She didn't respond till she felt someone lean against the adjacent side of her tree.

"That was some fall you took back there." Washu mentioned casually.

"Yes." Seita smoothed his distance to justify his hesitation.

"Is everything in order?"

"Enough so."

The repeated exchange of tones made Washu frown in thought, before testing a hint of the doubt she'd taken such care to contain.

"Have you reconsidered anything?"

"As far as what we've discussed? No."

She listened to him shift his shoulder and backpack against the tree with a more sincere and reserved voice. He was slightly disoriented, but hiding it well.

"Do you have anything more you'd like to ask?"

A bird sang through their pause then flew away, scolding a rival.

"Am I still a secret?"

"Yes. And only until they ask me."

The next pause was longer, and interjected with faint squeals from Sasami that would have been eerie to anyone who didn't know better.

Seita took his weight off the tree and stood. Washu found herself focusing more to detect his presence before he finally stepped up behind her. She turned in polite enough time, but instantly leaned back against the tree.

"I still haven't thanked you for anything," Seita stated, his gentle formality hiding an unpleasant certainty.

"No, you haven't."

Washu tried to swallow the deadness creeping over her throat, determined that she wouldn't rely on it this time.

"Nor have I apologized."

"You gave me back my daughter."

Washu began to breath for how quick and sharp the small voice had been. Seita's eyes avoided her, his breath held. Eventually he was looking away at nothing.

After examining the side of his numbed face for long enough, she blinked confusion that he might have seen her gazing softly. She forced a smile, discarded the force, and closed her eyes at the ground.

"And that's not all I mean." It strained her throat to speak, but a reassuring warmth continued to fill her. She would look at Seita after it passed.

"I can feel it; you took away more than the pain you recognized. There were tremendous amounts of suppressed anguish weighing down her mind, it was present every time I tried to use our link. Her experiences with Kagato and.....with myself, they all added to a violent fear and mistrust of everything around her---"

Washu grasped for a long breath but it slipped away, leaving her voice ever weaker.

"And this was before we ever knew you.....and I don't sense _any_ of it now. You'd think she'd spent these few weeks meditating with Yosho every morning."

Washu chuckled at herself and lifted her head into a reflex wipe at her eye. Seita was still watching the woods. She was about to look away again, but offered her own half smile instead.

"It's ironic," she began again with a more reflective tone, "that you could do so much good with that power.....and yet, it can only be accessed through-"

She tried to imitate difficulty with a joke that was still too fresh.

A sliver of velvet grew in the caressed space between his teeth and lower lip.

"No Washu, it's not."

Something that should have made her shiver made her speak boldly instead.

"Then how do we describe the fact that your prediction failed, that my machine failed, that we had to-"

The coldness in her voice became too brittle for itself. When the longest silence reached her center, she looked back, his eyes narrowed, his lips tight. The last shades of a familiar expression rose, then quickly faded quiet into singularly private shame. Not exactly like a recovery, he'd pulled his hand away from a former vice just the same.

"I'd rather not speak of it." Hushed sobriety, the ghost said its peace.

"Good." The echo of science stayed close.

Their next shared quiet was complete, no birds, no breeze, and the girls had gone inside minutes ago. Washu found herself stepping forward with arms folded and head down. She thought she felt his breath.

"The others must assume that the best reason to have killed you---would have been for the sake of insurance, protection."

She took another quarter step.

"The one thing I've managed to keep from them---is that a part of me wanted to keep you alive---as a reminder."

Seita pulled his head back, raised one eyebrow, furrowed both.

"I wanted to make sure your prediction never came true. I thought that, so long as you were alive, it would be too dangerous to provide an opportunity for you to---get back in."

"So then," he tried to keep his hushed fear just as even, "why not kill me after you were sure of Ryoko's recovery?"

He'd answered more swiftly than she'd expected, and she told herself she'd have to search for her answer with both eyes, have to speak quickly when she remembered it.

"Because, eventually, I---_was_ sure of Ryoko's recovery."

Washu could tell that he wanted to look away, but more so wanted her to do so. She could hear his teeth clack together and his throat clench as she took the last baby step between them and kissed him on the cheek.

"A heart that can come back from the emptiness is stronger than a mind that can resist it."

He had his head down when she pulled back to look at him, just as she'd expected, though she didn't quite know how to place her disappointment. Happy thoughts of her daughter came back and let her lean against the tree again, speaking clear and clever.

"Alright then, you better get out of here, only room for one sage on this mountain."

He didn't breathe for one and a longer moment, before he gave Washu the first real smile she'd ever seen, half of it anyway. She watched the sunlight through the branches as his footsteps disappeared.

Waiting for Yosho to finish sneaking up on her, she walked around the tree, fishing a few red hairs from nooks in the bark. She stood out closer to the meadow before returning to herself.

"Quiet day at the shrine?"

"_Yes_, yes it is I'm afraid." Yosho cleared his throat before casually closing the distance between them.

"We gotta think of a way to bring in the younger crowds."

"Mm."

"And we've gotta work on your stealth technique."

"I see," a quieting thought stepped out from under its mask of amusement, "perhaps the student falters when the professor becomes.....too forgiving."

Washu closed her eyes and swallowed, reaching back and finding his hand as easy as always, wrapping his arm around her.

"Maybe."

"Did you give him a ship?"

"A small one."

"Where do you think he'll go?"

"I'm not certain."

After running her fingertips gently across his forearm she leaned back into him to tickle his face with her hair, just enough to see the sky.

"But I have an educated guess."

000

Azusa marched passed servants and surveyors, each of them scurrying away like vermin at the sight of his progressive anger.

"Your Highness, there really is no need to get-" A spindly man in freshly spun robes clung to dignity as he tried to match steps with the emperor. The two queens flew on their robes behind him, entirely practiced in keeping up.

"I told you, very clearly, that I would speak with _each_ counselor before they went _near_ my daughter."

"I know Your Highness, forgive me, but he comes recommended from five high dukes. In fact, he has come out of a long retirement specifically for the honor of aiding the princess."

"I fail to see how that is supposed to reassure me."

The spindly man gulped. Funaho noticed Misaki's face sink a little further, she reached out and took her fellow queen's hand. Their eyes met, worry for support, gratitude for connection.

000

Aeka sat at her vanity desk, surrounded by freshly dusted boxes and bobbles that hadn't been used in ages. She looked at her folded hands, at the seas of lush forest outside her window, all the same. The soft voice from the man sitting behind her wafted on and on, the mirror betraying his disappointment. He'd started off with a string of formalities, then small questions, then reassurances, then she'd let his voice turn to air just like all the others. Her stomachache had caught her head, but it felt like they were simply on an old display behind older bars; not much she could do about them, even had she the interest.

"Very well then, I think that will conclude our time today."

It was necessary to keep one ear open for the word 'conclude', it was the one they always used, without fail; nothing more encouraging and certainly nothing simpler. She tried not to hear the word 'today', so arrogantly, so foolishly presumptuous of a tomorrow. While waiting for the door to attempt relief, she instead heard the man shuffle in his case and walk up behind her. The tin blades in her face coiled as the thought crept in to whirl around and startle a real voice out of him. Again, she merely fixed her jaw and imagined the taste of chalk.

"I beg your pardon Highness, but I was asked by a friend of a colleague to bring this letter to you. It's already been opened and cleared by security, of course."

Aeka saw the shadow over her shoulder then glanced up and saw its reflection in the mirror, along with her own. She promptly looked back down at the blank space on the desk.

"Leave it."

Her voice buzzed mechanically in her throat, but it felt like she hadn't even expended the energy to pull her jaw apart.

The latest, long uncounted, would-be counselor left without another word. As per usual her parents would be coming in for a follow up, for her mother's tears as she resisted her anger and her father's inverse of the same. They were right of course; she was being childish, just as she'd been right when she told them this was none of their fault, then increased that they'd done nothing wrong. This was her own weakness, a naïve, spoiled little princess who should be forced to spend another 700 years stewing in a tower till she was ready to be an adult.

By an accidental glance she noticed that the envelope was made from Washu's faint crab motif stationary, it wasn't even an envelope, but a half sheet of paper weighed down by the remains of a seal. A few pieces of iron worked their way into her chest as she thought again of earth and of everything. She picked up the note and began work on the will not to be consumed with sobs before she even opened it.

_To her Royal Highness Aeka_

_First Princess of Jurai,_

_I am uncertain when this letter will reach you, or if it will reach you at all, but I hope that it provides aid._

Aeka let her eyes roll off the paper, and would have rolled them back up in cynical dismissal if she'd felt like wasting the effort. She dropped the note and was leaning back in her chair when she noticed that she hadn't recognized the penmanship. It wasn't Washu's, or anyone else that had sent her numbing, cliché attempts to feel like they hadn't abandoned her, or didn't feel abandoned themselves. She picked it up again.

_I am uncertain when this letter will reach you, or if it will reach you at all, but I hope that it provides aid. If it does not, then I have done little more than flatter myself for writing it, an entirely unnecessary act, as you would well know. _

_If you yet remain in the emotionally withdrawn position the nobility isn't supposed to say you are, then I will offer some counsel in this impersonal form, as it would be impractical to try and gain closer access._

_From the way you reacted to the illusionary death of your sister, and even by the way you looked at Ryoko after her torments, it is clear that you are not an uncaring person. By the lengths you went through to pursue Tenchi's love it is clear that you desire happiness. These things alone are all you need to rise above any counterproductive state. _

_That you are a princess must make no more difference than were you a farmer. Your loving parents, your devoted subjects; reminders of your fortune do quick and little good, mostly for those who cannot provide genuine aide. _

_You have proven yourself worthy of more than contentment on countless occasions, so take a dose of your own medicine and cure yourself. By my previous ambition, I never would have considered you a candidate for 'easy' self-destruction, much less a willful purveyor of apathy. By my experience there is never want for self-pity. _

_And in my professional opinion- _

_There is no need for grief. _

Aeka stared at the letter with frozen eyes, its extravagant and illegible signature, wondering which reaction between fear and disgust had gone missing. All she could sense were the words, processing, taken apart and perhaps to heart. A few venting tears shimmered back in the mirror, her, The First Princess of Jurai, who had survived worse things than rejection. Thus, before her parents could arrive, the first of many free sessions began.

000

Two sisters observed together, surrounded by, and ever-absorbing the growth of all. Their knowledge and their power; through existence always ready. As their knowledge of themselves and their others: always ready. Aware of their relative infinity, often painfully aware of such relativity, and just as often painfully aware of their relatives. They communicated politely despite and for no competition, the more aggressive of the two beginning this time, as she always willed.

_This one's given us quite a trouble._

_Given us quite a scare._

_Still, I admit, there may be something yet to gain._

_Then, do you submit? There might be more to give? _

_We can take no credit for him._

_Yes, but can we accept no blame?_

_We shall be more careful that this does not happen again._

_Are we so certain this has not happened before?_

_No need to be._

_No need to be._

..._..How is your champion then, and his newly liberated family?_

_He is well, and they are well--- and liberated enough to remain mine._

_Yes, but what of our sister, she cannot remain anymore than your host can._

_Perhaps if I could worry less about you I could care more for them, for us._

_It will remain speculation---but since we've seen so much of this through, perhaps I could contribute something to them? Some future inspiration for my own champions. _

_Why don't we give them a gift? _

_Together?_

_Yes. It's been a while. _

_For good reason. _

_All the more reason. _

_Shall we let them know they've received it? _

_You decided. _

_Very well, I'll let them decide. _

_Something grand then? _

_No, something small. _

_Something difficult then. _

_Perhaps we could compose. _

_Some verse? _

_Yes. _

_Recite. _

Thus Tsunami began, and her sister Tokimi continued. And back. And forth. And so on. And so it was done.

_The prize and title secured._

_The enhancement and disguise._

_His sanctuary and asylum._

_His fantasies and lies._

_And if oblivion was._

_Then it surely must be._

_Still the loneliest of all._

_Will all know that they are free._

_Letting go the end-games._

_As each war was just a play._

_Keeping close the villain._

_Who was a hero for a day._

-END


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